CJS57

Anyone found this or did their own testing? My 2010 ES 350 "felt" just as quick with 30 less HP. Maybe because the 2019 is so much smoother?

signdetres

I think it's because these newer cars are so smooth and refined from powertrain to noise/vibration/harshness isolation that you just don't feel the sensation of speed like you would in cars of yesteryear. Even suspension control is remarkably improved which contributes to less squat under hard acceleration (when the nose of the car lifts up), especially if your car has AVS as it can actively compensate for these types of body motions. Lastly I think it has something to do with the way these cars deliver power due to their naturally aspirated V6 motors in which power comes on in a more linear fashion with RPM rather than all at once like in a turbocharged car. I think when you combine all of these factors, it makes the cars feel slower when in reality, they're quicker or just as quick, you just don't feel it.

95bat

The last article I read placed it at 6 seconds 0-60.

Whether you're in a 2010 or 2019, you can squeeze in a power nap before they hit 100

User 41924

I would have thought that having 8 gears rather than 6 would offset any gearing changes. The ES is basically the same drive train I had in my IS350, which although it felt faster, I'm not sure it was. I think the engine and wind noise in makes you think you're going faster than you are. The ES is so quiet and smooth, it's almost eerie when accelerating hard.

I may be wrong, but I think the ES is almost as fast as my '02 Camaro Z28 that I thought was a race car! The ES actually has more stock HP than the Z28, but the sound it made was glorious.

1stTimeLex

I sent my kid on a gas run and he 'mentioned' that it feels like a 6.5-ish 0-60 time... which probably translates to him stomping my car with his buddy running stopwatch during the run. I forgot to set nanny modes before they left.

mikemu30

6.5 is probably about right. Congrats - your ES is officially broken in 😁

95bat

You're a bit off

The LS1 in the '02 F-body was underrated from the factory. Most of them put down 300rwhp, or about 350 at the crank. It was also RWD with MUCH more torque. Those cars ran low 13s stock in the 1/4 mile, some unicorn runs even had them in the high 12s stock. It's about 2 full seconds faster than the ES in the 1/4 mile At those speeds it's roughly 20 car lengths ahead lol (usually 1/10s of a second is about 1 car lengh)

I'm a bit of a fan... my first car was a 1995 Firebird I love 4th gen F-bodies!

User 41924

Torque rating for the '02 Camaro Z28 was 340 Lb-Ft. The ES has 267. So ..... You're right. That's a pretty big difference

My point was slightly different, though. The Camaro is a "muscle car" with a "big V8" and in my case, a 6 speed manual. No one would expect a V6 powered luxury car that probably weighs an extra 300 pounds, to REALLY be as fast. Even me! My point was, the ES still feels quick by Lexus standards, which aren't race car standards. My comparison to the Camaro may have been a bit of a sarcastic reach to make a point, which I did acknowledge.

lesz

I'm sure that my feelings about what is good/sufficient power are influenced by the fact that I'm old enough to remember the 1970s. In the mid 1970s, the US was faced with fuel shortages, and I can remember times when there were lines that were blocks long with people waiting to fill up their gas tanks at the stations that had gas. The result of those shortages was that, for over a decade, the auto manufacturers responded to the call for more fuel efficient vehicles by cutting horsepower in the cars that they were building.

I can recall the 1983 Pontiac Trans Am that I owned. It was marketed as a very sporty and peppy car, but its 4.9 liter V8 engine put out only 150 hp. Frankly, the car was a complete dog with regard to power. Toward the late 1980s, cars with 200 hp and that had 0-60 times in the 7+ second range were considered to be very fast. Even the Generation 4 ES that I bought over a dozen years ago with about 225 hp seemed to me like it had every bit as much power as I needed.

The Toyota/Lexus V6 engines have always reminded me of the small block V8 engines that were the staple for many GM vehicles in the 1960s. They had a reasonable amount of horsepower that could be delivered over a wide rpm range.

Today, if I was interested in 0-60 times or times for a standing quarter mile, a Lexus ES would not be on the list of cars that I would even think about buying. For me, at this point in my life, my interest in good power relates to knowing that, when I'm driving on a hilly or curvy 2-lane road and when I want to pass a slow moving vehicle, I'm going to be able to pull out into the other lane, quickly accelerate from, say, 40-60, and be able to get safely back into my lane before the next hill or curve. And that is something that the ES (including the Generation 6 ES), with a wide power band that allows the car to quickly use its available power over a wide rpm range, does very well. Again, if I was interested in 0-60 times, the ES is not the car that I would want to buy.