Wednesday, December 19, 2018

Lexi2 the Chariot: Budget Build

It's obvious this website came about as a result of my first V8 Lexus which ended up being a lemon. There's a lot more to it, however. To be quite honest, it changed my direction in life.

Lexi2... the Chariot. What other title?!

I suppose I was really looking for something I enjoy doing to start some sort of career. When I got the original Lexi, a 1995 salvage rebuilt title LS400, it was not only coming from a small wreck but it had other problems too. As a matter of fact, that car had so many problems I fixed myself that from start to finish, I went from being able to change my brakes to knowing about every system in the car.

I'm still an amateur but my skills improved ten times over and that was actually part of the goal. Only I expected to keep that car for a long time once I was done working on it. What ended up happening was totally unexpected.

The whole idea is a high quality budget build. In two cases, the dashboard and center armrest, I'm going with a cover similar to what's on the seats. The seat covers will not be staying

It started with one or two minor problems that turned into a few others once I fixed them and those continued to create more and more problems. By the end of it all, that car would take a good 20 seconds to make it to 30 mph and top out. When I say this was a lemon, it was a LEMON.

I had one chance to get that logo right. The cover was complete besides that... Logical huh?

Knowing that I would spend way too much money on this if I was going to continue fixing it, I started looking for another LS400. This is when I found Lexi2. I feel like it was fate. Or, actually, I was just blessed. But to make a long story short, this was a car with a couple weird problems that was being sold by a lady with a medical condition. Recently diagnosed and told she could no longer drive, she needed medicine money and didn't need the car.

I had $350 and my own car. She was asking for $900, I believe, but I shot her a quick text offering a trade plus the $350 so she could at least junk the other car and make $500. What she did was tell me I could have it and keep my car. I was astounded.

I had to have that color in the car. That cherry red leather? Beautiful.

I drove it around the Publix parking lot before it was obvious to me that the car had very weird symptoms keeping customers away. I had been watching this car for almost a month. From my previous experience with the first car, though, I knew intuitively that it had a simple misfire with a simple fix.

It would buck on you, had a rough idle where the car would shake, and other similar symptoms. New spark plugs, plug wires, fuel pump plus filter, and a little clean of the distributor caps which some had a little corrosion later, I had a smooth running car.

To this day it has the same check engine code because of the corrosion. It's a random misfire code, p0130. Soon, when I stop being lazy, I'm gonna change out the caps and the code should go away. All of the symptoms are gone, at least.

Remember, I cleaned it and not even very well, but one of the distributor caps had corrosion at the contact points where the wires from the coil packs attach, actually. It makes perfect sense that it impedes the flow of electricity causing a misfire. In my case, it's minor enough to not do anything except very rarely misfire very slightly while idling cold. That's enough to set off the code. So really, I haven't messed with it because simply it isn't causing any problems but at the same time, I'm just gonna go ahead and fix that up soon. I have the caps.

At 220,000 miles, this car runs smoother than a friend's 130,000 mile 1999 LS400 - quite a feat in my eyes. I had the timing belt and water pump changed. Overall, I'm sure I'm going to get a lot of miles out of this car with very little mechanical problems.

It's sturdy. Work has been done to it, including new coil packs and shocks in the back, what looks like possibly new motor mounts, the A/C was fixed at 80,000 miles, and a few other minor things.

This is the one I'm gonna keep for as long as I can imagine. It would be stupid for me to sell it and the car is gonna be a classic one day. The price of it can only go up but truly, this is my dream car as far as a daily driver goes.

I tinted my headlights yellow and added blue fog lights in the bumper. The switch is encased in a Crown Royal bag. It's just classy.

In my humble opinion, this car was made at a time where the amount of technology in the car is perfect. Most vehicles these days have sensors upon sensors, everything is controlled by a computer, and you can't even work on some of these cars yourself. With all of these electronics, something small can go bad and your car won't run properly or at all.

This LS400 has OBDII which started in 1995 for this model and only has essential sensors. Even the 1998 to 2000 models are drive-by-wire, meaning there's a sensor connected to the gas pedal that tells the computer how much throttle you're giving it. The computer, then, opens the throttle body. I don't care how fast the computer can respond, it can never replicate the feeling of mechanically opening the throttle body by pushing the gas pedal.

With the OBDII you can read codes which makes it much easier to track down issues but like I said, the car was made when there wasn't all of these fancy electronics in cars so thankfully, it has the perfect mix.

That gave me 5 horsepower back.

I enjoy it very much. The horsepower is very nice to have. I drive pretty fast but I rarely hit the gas. To be honest, I've only done it a few times. I also did a little rally of my own at night on these dark winding streets and that was the most fun I have ever had in a car. I mean hey, I had to test it. I didn't want any weak links. At least that's my excuse. Really though, I just remember time slowing down, my side vision getting blurry, and the most euphoric rush of adrenaline.

Now I'm no stranger to things like this but I was a front wheel drive turbo junky, really. To do it in this V8 beast of a sedan was such a different experience and a total pleasure.

The car is so inspirational to me that I started a business selling used auto parts and I recently reached the same income I was getting at my previous job. It was health reasons that made me lose it but it was for the best in hindsight.

LEDs that I can change the color of, of course. I like green. It matches the gauges.

The car continues to inspire me. I have so many plans for it. Guys and gals, I really am broke hence the website. But this domino effect that started two years ago has almost brought me to a point where I can be independent simply from my own business. And all of this started with a car! An amazing car. I suppose reaching my goal of finally owning one was inspiring enough (despite how cheap these cars are) but it was more than that. It opened my mind to so many possibilities.


Total: ~$1500
- Rokas Kirvelis

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