Practically Classics Forum

Apologies for those of you who frequent AR Online's forums, you'll have seen some of this before

After all the hassle I had in June looking to replace my Merc, by the beginning of July I was feeling very dejected about the whole process of car buying & had pretty much sworn off the idea of even looking for another barge for a while, when I saw a tweet from one of the blogger's I follow regarding an adjustment he'd made to an advert on Petrolheads. Somehow I'd missed the original postings of this advert, which was for an early UK-spec LS400 with a rather interesting history. You see, this car had been used by Lexus as a press car, but not when it was new; it had been bought back by the company in 2010 for their 20th anniversary!

Anyway, because the car was used in the press fleet, I can let you read more about it by linking to articles online:

Report on the car being reviewed by Autocar, on LexusEnthusiast.com:
http://lexusenthusiast.com/2010/06/01/a ... us-ls-400/

Autocar's own online version of the article:
http://www.autocar.co.uk/blogs/stillatt ... rgain.aspx

LexusEnthusiast.com report on the rediscovery of the original demonstrator, which is what caused my car to become surplus to requirements:
http://lexusenthusiast.com/2010/07/28/f ... urns-home/

And that article on its native website:
http://www.mikeslife.org/content/how-tw ... -back-home

A video from Lexus UK comparing the LS400 & LS600H, on LexusEnthusiast.com:
http://lexusenthusiast.com/2010/12/13/c ... -ls-600hl/
Publicity stills are my car, video is the original demonstrator; makes me wonder if another version of the video exists using my car instead…

Keith Adams (Octane, AR Online) swapped the Lexus for his SD1 for a couple of weeks, his brief report is here:
http://www.aronline.co.uk/blogs/2010/08 ... us-factor/
He also commented on AR Online "I loved that car" when I posted that I'd bought it

And finally running reports from Tim Hutton at RacingandWaiting.co.uk, who owned the car after Lexus & then sold it to me!
http://www.racingandwaiting.co.uk/2011/ ... ls400-pt1/
http://www.racingandwaiting.co.uk/2011/ ... ls400-pt2/

So far I'm really enjoying it; it's extremely relaxed even at motorway speeds, which shouldn't be surprising as that's barely half of it's capability. It's got more toys than my Mercedes had, & they all seem to work. It's not flawless, but having had it inspected by a dealer I know what's wrong & will be getting it fixed; mechanically it's very sound, cosmetically it has a couple of signs of age but by no means does it look 20+ years old.

I'm currently taking any opportunity I can find to drive it; this won't be good for my fuel bills, & my Allegros are beginning to look a little jealously at their new "big sister" Olivia (or Livvie for short), but it's just so effortless that it's addictive!

I notice it's a Carlisle registration (HH). I bought my Maxi from the local agent's Penrith branch - it jumped out of second from the day I bought it!

However, they did have a loyal following of customers for Toyota cars, so I would guess their Lexus agency would be pretty sound!

Hope this one turns out as good as the last purchase was bad! As you say, it has an interesting history and obviously a pretty unique car.

Carlisle? Odd, it was sold through Toyota Park Lane! I guess perhaps Carlisle is where it was imported through? I'll have to check up on this... I have a photocopy of the original V5, maybe that'll help shed light on things.

Anyone know how you get a car's history from DVLA?

The local agent is Jim Walton:

http://www.jimwalton.co.uk/

They are Penrith-based, though HH could still apply for cars registered in that area after Swansea took over registration allocation. We lived near Penrith in the 70's and our new Marina was PHH. It might be worth sending them an email - they used to keep good records and, as I wrote, have a good reputation as Toyota agents and slow turnover of staff, so may remember the car if they did sell it (it could be a personal number!!).

OneCarefulOwner wrote:Carlisle? Odd, it was sold through Toyota Park Lane! I guess perhaps Carlisle is where it was imported through? I'll have to check up on this... I have a photocopy of the original V5, maybe that'll help shed light on things.

Anyone know how you get a car's history from DVLA?

V888 and a fiver, just make sure you ask for ALL of the information they have. Of course a plate like HHH could be a personal plate bought and put on by a previous owner, or indeed the original purchaser, so would bear no relationship to its registering district area.

Nah, it's the original number - like I said, I have a copy of the original V5 & it shows no re-registration; the DVLA had only just started selling new numbers in 1990, but they wouldn't have sold a plate with this combination of numerals so I doubt it's a personal plate on first registration either.

Sadly, today the electric aerial packed up; I can still manually raise/lower the antenna almost completely which is a bonus, but it's a shame that it failed. Spoken to the dealer doing the brakework & he's told me the potential point of failure, and the price for a new one… I think I'll try & fix the old one first!

OneCarefulOwner wrote:Sadly, today the electric aerial packed up;

Well, what do you expect? Dreadfully unreliable, Lexus! I'd give up and buy something else.....

Ony joking - I'd have one myself if I was in the market for a big "Luxobarge" again.....

The really annoying thing is, having seen the number, I'm pretty sure I've seen the car somewhere!

I suspect it's one of those "association" things - there weren't many Lexuses in the county, so seeing one was unusual. H and HHH would be fairly unusual, so I suspect I'm putting the two together and getting totally confused (850 would stick in my mind from my Mini days).

I now need to know who owned it! The only Lexii I knew was when I worked in a school in Penrith (98-05) and some of the parents were rather keen on expensive cars with personal plates.