Best Advice Buying a 25 Year Old Car

I want to give you the best tip anyone can give you if you're going to buy a 25 year old luxury car like a Lexus LS400 or something similar. But first, let me tell you a little story that shows this is what you need if you don't want to suffer many headaches.

You see, I bought both of my LS400s with the last of my money and between the two cars, I think I'm going on year 3 driving these cars living paycheck-to-paycheck. Ok, I'll just give you the advice.

Have $1,000 set aside just for problems that will come up. Even if you're a mechanic - which helps a lot - you may need tows and parts. Set that aside JUST for the car and trust me.

This is what happened two days ago that made me write this article. I'm telling you, I was ready to trade this car in for an '80s Chevy truck. I was practically spitting on it. Today I love the car again.

Here is the problem with older cars and especially ones that lived where it snows. They rust. Where it's hot, stuff dry rots. So even though the major problems are actually few and far between as long as you do the major maintenance, there's going to be gremlins that pop up that will make you wanna kick the motor.

I was going to Walmart for five quarts of oil because, of course, my car leaks oil. I noticed my car was kind of driving shaky. All of a sudden, I thought my damn tire partly broke off the studs because I started hearing the worst banging from the back right. I pull over as soon as I can.

I check the wheel and somehow I didn't see that there was a bump in the tire but the noise was from the right side of my exhaust breaking off! The weld rusted through! Well, better than my wheel. I managed to get home and got the exhaust clamped down good.

So I went for a test drive around the neighborhood and I keep hearing a noise from my tire. I pull over and check again - the tire is holding air but it has a half foot bump with wires going everywhere. Great.

Remember, I'm broke so I patched my spare using a screwdriver to stick that gummy stuff in a nail hole. That was fun. So now I've conquered two issues and I'm ready to go to the store.

I grab my wife. I should've let her rest because a few miles down the road, the car just died. I mean it just shut off. No warning, just off. I put it in park and it cranks but it will NOT start. At this point, I still hadn't eaten and was so tired I wasn't thinking straight.

A nice gentleman gave me a push to a mechanic parking lot. Yeah, he just drove up behind me with his truck and pushed. Interesting feeling.

I try and try to figure it out but I had to give up. I just couldn't think straight anymore, I was tired, and my wife wasn't feeling too good so I paid for a tow truck.

I managed to get a code before it came but I had no idea where to start. It was P1305 - something to do with the ignition system. I quickly Googled it and a random website rated the difficulty as 3/3... The hardest. Great. I know the car well but I'm not that good.

This is where experience comes in. This is the next day. When I say I've fixed over 25 different problems on the two LS400s I've had, I'm not lying. Still, even the internet wasn't helpful. Then it hit me. I have an extra coil pack. That's part of that system so screw it, let me change it out.

Boy, when I took off the one that was on there, the problem was evident. The coil pack has two electrical connectors yet for months this car ran with just one plugged in! I don't know if it was just close enough to where a spark was enough but that wasn't right at all.

Matter of fact, the lower clip definitely hadn't been on there for a long time because it was dry rotted in a position where it wouldn't even let the coil pack slide on. I had to break the clip and connect the connectors naked. Again, fun - no room. It took a while. I plugged in the upper connector for the spark plugs and the car fired right up.

So WHAT is my point? My point is that if you want a car like this, you need to teach yourself to work on them and in the best case scenario, you want that thousand dollars in the bank. Inevitably something will come up that you can't do.

I actually knew very little about cars when I got the 1995 and taught myself. I bought it crashed for $300 with that intent. I learned a lot from that one but it was a true lemon and I junked it when I found my current 1996.

Be ready for frustrating problems like a loose connector somewhere. The ACV part of the power steering will eventually fail - look up my "ACV Delete" article. Be aware that although these cars are reliable - it has gotten me home when other cars wouldn't have drove at all - but it's starting to get old. And that's the problem. Things rust, rot, and dry out.

However, with some planning, love, and mental endurance, you will eventually mow through all of the problems that come up and you will essentially have a car with mostly new components. I look at it like this. Of course the previous owner didn't put love into the car so I have to make up for it and eventually I will reach a point where every system is running fine.

This applies to any car.

If this is your only car, there will be days or weeks where you're riding the bus but when the car runs right... It runs right.

- Rokas K., Automotive Dummy

Lexi Phase 2: The To-Do + Ro Needs Help

Getting Lexi the 1996 Lexus LS400 to a reliable state honestly feels great. The maintenance along with some aesthetic modifications brought the car to Phase 1. This is where it's at.

(Sidenote: if you want to help this car get built faster, go to the very bottom of this article. Not asking for money.)

The car just passed 225,000 miles and she hasn't run this good since I've had her. I'm not kidding, either. There was the mildest rough idle as a leftover from the "Random Misfire" code I still have. I believe it is P0300. It has not happened in a few days. I am truly happy with the motor and transmission. Keep reading to see how I got rid of the misfire.

Looks good for now but I definitely need to reupholster the interior.

When I first picked the car up, it was definitely misfiring badly. It would buck a couple times before reaching 50 mph and good luck if you got there, boy! She would buck like a horse. Just no ignition period. The fix was to give it a little more gas or let off the gas a little bit.

The code never went away but I fixed it. I changed out the spark plugs and spark plug wires to new ones. I used a Japanese brand. You should always use Japanese spark plugs and even sensors on these cars even if they say they're compatible.

I also changed out the old fuel pump which was part of the problem. It was just something that happens when you don't do maintenance, people. As far as that code...

My theory is that the computer senses that there is some sort of remnant from that misfire. I never changed the distributor rotors or caps. I don't plan on doing the rotors unless I figure out that's definitely the problem. However I have both distributor caps that I am gonna go ahead and change out. Might finally have no code.

You may be thinking that although I don't feel it, it might be reducing performance a bit. Well I was paying attention to my RPMs and acceleration very much. You see, the rough idle was fixed recently by something that I wasn't using for that...

This is what the problem was. At a red light, sometimes the idle would go up about 100 RPMs. Always assumed it was that random misfire.

Well I have another problem to deal with that I will get to in a minute. I have a bad oil leak and although ofcourse I'm saving money to get it fixed, it's taking a long time. This repair will be $4-800 depending on if it's a valve cover gasket or the camshaft or crankshaft seals.

So this is how my mildly rough idle was finally soldved. By the way, if you're looking to learn something, leave, cause this was magic. You see, I used a Stop Oil Leak product. You should never put funny liquids in your engine but I had mild success once. This product, although made by the same company for the same purpose as the one I used before, was different.

They're both made by Bar's. What happened was that my rough idle would show itself rarely at this point but once I put this Stop Oil Leak product in, things changed fast.

Immediately, my idle would jump over and over. F#&$. I drove it for about 60 miles and I was actually thinking of cleaning out my throttle body when I realized I have MMO. What is that? Marvel Mystery Oil.

It's a mystery but it WORKS damnit. Everything it says on the bottle, it does. And you can use it like ten times! What is it really? It's a product that has been around since the 1920s. It was an oil additive because it has detergent properties. Oil in the 1920s had no additives so to extend the life of the motor and prevent it from getting gummed up from sludge, people would add MMO to the oil.

Which is exactly what MMO does to your car. Put it in your oil (up to 20% volume - no, I used a fifth of the bottle and it worked great). First start I could already feel it working. But not like it's supposed to...

Oh yeah! Forgot to put it in the gas. It cleans your fuel injectors. Once I did that, Lexi purrs. Oh and Stop Oil Leak products taint the inside of your engine. Stop using them! Shame on me because the same thing happened in my old car with some product I forget.

There are TWO good products you can use in your car. They are SeaFoam (both the type you pour in and the type you spray in your throttle body) and Marvel Mystery Oil. Forget everything else. UV dyes are good too. But nothing that "fixes" your engine.

Phase 2 Requirements

I'm going to start from the easiest or what I can do to what will take some time. By the time this car hits Phase 3, it will actually be honorable on the road. I know it needs paint and has some scratches. But it hauls a$$! No really, it needs a lot more work to get those stares.

1. Carpet

The carpet, unfortunately, was stained to death when I bought this car. I'm not really sure how I'm going to get it out. It seems like layer after layer of coffee and dirt? I don't know but whatever it is, a typical carpet cleaner with the scrubber doesn't do much.

So I'm going with some good ol' fashioned detergent. It breaks down grease and other dirt. Going by how bad that stain is, I will probably have to scrub it, vacuum, and do that five times.

If I can't get it period, I'm just going to use vinyl paint to repaint the carpet. This way the carpet will look super fresh.

2. Paint

I bought the car with most of the clear coat gone and one fender was a different color. At this point, I've painted the fender a gloss white; the same color I'm gonna use for the rest of the upper body of the car.

The second tone was originally going to be white but it gets so dirty that I changed my mind. I'm going with a gunmetal gray or something like that.

And rims? By Phase 2, I want to have new rims but while I'm running on stocks, I need to paint them. They look really bad with half of the paint peeling off the center plastic cap. One rim has managed to grow bubbles. I don't know how I'm gonna get rid of that.

I'm going to do the paint myself. There's an old article describing how to do a professional paint job with certain spray paints. The coats came out perfect when I tested it. Now I just need a good long day to do it.

3. Engine

The engine is running fine right now although like I mentioned, there's a couple problems. The main thing is the oil leak. I want to meticulously clean the engine but I can't do it while there's a leak - it comes back.

During Phase 1, I want to solve the random misfire code. I've even had it flash on and off like it wants to go off. Anyway, if it's not the distributor caps, I am at a loss for what it is. Well, maybe distributor rotors too but that's a big job. Oh well - if that's it, I'm doing it.

I've wanted a good exhaust basically since I got the car but recently I realized that I don't want to mess with the car and have it throw up codes for sound. When I get to Phase 2, though, it's going to be a little different. The supercharger will need a good exhaust...

4. Body.

There's two dents I may be able to pop. There's also places where the paint got scratched and rust is starting to form. I'm gonna sand those spots down.

5. Interior.

Upholstery - this is gonna be the big one. I've practiced enough. I know I can reupholster my seats along with the center console and other areas.

Basic idea? Get the car looking right, running right, and feeling right.

I'm going to get it inspected to make sure I didn't miss anything. When the time comes, that supercharger will go in a rebuilt motor. My tranny is surprisingly good. It may have been changed at some point before I got the car because it shifts so fast and smooth. Not like the 1995 I had. The supercharger is in the next phase so give me a while.

So people, I just want you to follow along. I'm going to post a tutorial or guide on anything I do so that it's easier for the next generation. Not gonna lie, it is hard to find info on LS400s nowadays and the people at a certain Club Lexus forums won't help. I plan on learning a lot these next 12 months so why not join me?

Bonus

My tastes change about every... Two weeks? If anybody is interested, this is the plan with the interior. Colors are subject to change but I'm liking what I have picked out.

Everything is going to be restored. First - the dash. I thought about white but it wouldn't fit and would get really dirty. I've though about a full cover as well but I want to restore it and not just cover it up. I will probably be making a new dash cover to match the material I plan to use to restore the seats.

The seats are going to be furry. I have enough people that hate my car already so why not push it a little further? Jokes aside, I really like the idea of furry seats with everything else being leather. The seats are going to be black probably with some dark red to match the shifter and part of the center console.

Anyway, the dash will be taken out and painted gloss black. The center console will be reupholstered where there's leather, probably the top being this red leather and the bottom being black leather.

The red would be the accent tone. I will be leaving a lot of the original beige except I'm going to repaint everything. The interior is almost 25 years old so it's obviously fading a little.

Of course I have to add some personal touches. Although I like the woodgrain around the buttons and everywhere else, it might have to be modernized... You will have to wait and see.

I have to remove the clear piece of plastic around the shifter without breaking it so I can get the moisture out and possibly change the font of P R N D 3 2 L. I'm too far in to sell the car now so I have to make it mine completely.

Upholstery takes a long time so that will be 60% of this phase. I plan on really getting my skill up and paying attention to every little detail. I am so dedicated that I am putting everything else on hold unless it needs attention, of course. When it's done... I think I'm gonna sleep in it.

Jokes aside, I still remember doing a horrible job reupholstering the shifter on my previous lemon of a car, the black 1995 Lexus LS400. Now I'm at the point where I can do the very thing I was striving for?! It's a very rewarding feeling to me. Look for articles mainly concerning upholstery work and a few about cars for the next month or so.


P.S. Will somebody tell me what kind of content you want to see? Would you rather see a review of a car, info on a good cheap car, something else? Please tell me in the comments!

Thanks for reading,

- Rokas K.

P.S. A call for help.

I'm gonna make this short and sweet. I don't want money (I do but don't send it). Have any spares lying around that you think I can use? Want to help me wrench on the car and live in the Poinciana/Kissimmee/Orlando, FL area? Contact me through Instagram at @rokask1 or email me at norgin@gmail.com. I figured there might be someone out there actually wanting to do this so come join me and you will get full recognition somehow. I could use help with anything and LS400 people are generally cool. Holla!

Heavily Customized Cars

There are some people in this world that don't conform to our social norms. This is most evident in the car scene. The amount of different styles of modification is already crazy enough. There's hotrods, tuners, track babies, showcars, and many more styles of car building.

I want to talk about my favorite. Nothing screams "Passion!" like a fully customized car. Please understand - I am not talking about cars that have been painted, have nice rims, suspension, etc. I'm talking about cars that are completely unique. My favorite ones are the ones you can't tell what car it is right away. Example?

Yes, I thought it was a Dodge too at first. It's an LS400. The lines on the side gave it away.

I'm going to include slightly modified cars to kind of show the progression.  What I want to talk about, though, is the rare unicorn that is a completely customized car and the people that build them. The first person to ever inspire me was my grandfather who, I believe in the 1970s in Lithuania, built his own car from parts he had.

The man ran a successful mechanic shop and although I never got to question him about the car fully, he made a very nice, luxury car from what he had. Don't ask me what motor or anything. I know it had a custom body reminiscent of those big, old cars gangsters would drive in the 1930s and 1940s. The back had no trunk - it was rounded. I'm sorry but I don't know classics like that or I would give you something to compare it to. Just imagine a 1940s gangster car where they're unloading automatics into a store.

Grandpa Kestas Reklys had to join together a frame, suspension, motor, transmission, body, and connect all of the gauges and seats. The man was a jack of all trades and a master at some. I mentioned in another article that he built two houses.

When it comes to these completely custom cars, I want you to imagine the process the builders went through. Let's go back to the Lexus above. I would be surprised if they didn't completely gut the car. Then they had to fabricate the parts to make the front end look right - not to mention making it. This is a front end swap. It's hands down my favorite type of modification. It turns the car into something completely different.

My dream is a back end swap. I want an LS400 wagon.

The amount of customization differs from one person to the next. This Nissan caught my eye. I've seen a few of these wide body kits but never have I seen someone running 50mm spacers. My jaw dropped when he told me. I said 30mm? And he drifts it. He knows it's dangerous. The balls on that guy...

But what caught my eye was the faded paint and how awesome it actually looks with the wide body kit. It looks like something out of Mad Max. It had a nice exhaust so it shows the guy put good work into it. He said he was eventually going to paint it, though.

Funny - a true car enthusiast will do paint last. Always.

That Nissan is a good example of a car somewhere near the midpoint of the build. I don't know if he just wants some paint and that's it but I doubt it.

I used to think that most custom cars were made in a shop and bought. Turns out that a lot of these cars were created by their owners over time. I used to think you had to have money to do this but it's not true. Yes, it does cost a lot, but you will be putting it in little by little. The average person makes enough money to maintain the car and save up the extra money to get something new here and there. Years later, the car is a complete beauty?

I've had at least three people with very nice cars tell me this; little by little!

Next is a 1990s Lincoln? I believe. This one is customized very little. Just a big drop and paint job. Thing is, I've never seen one of these cars looking like that. And you know what? It looks amazing slammed like that! Made me want one.


(X Mercury X)

These cars are all vehicles I saw on the road except for this Celica. It's truly hard to find a completely customized car. The owner of this beauty has customized his headlights to be one long bar which, to me, is a great look and great idea. It really makes the car stand out

You can do something simple like this and change the entire look and feel of the car. This brings me to the whole point of this article;

1. You don't need to be rich to create an amazing custom car.

2. Small things can completely change the look.

3. Do what YOU like and don't get discouraged by anything - within reason. There are times when we come up with an idea that seems great at the time but a few days later you ask yourself "What was I thinking?" It's good to write your ideas down before you implement them.

4. Write your ideas down. Have a notebook just for that. I have a good 40 designs in mine of which I've used maybe 5-6 and I am waiting for the resources to do some of the others.

5. Before you do any big modifications, you HAVE to fix any problems the car has first. Fix your check engine lights, maybe get a tune, get it inspected. You need to know what potential problems may arise.

6. Have $300 set aside just in case something breaks (more if you can afford it).

7. This goes with 5 and 6; when initially fixing your car, you can start spending a little bit of money like $20 for every $100 you put in to fixing the car. That's what kept me sane waiting. $20 gets you a lot; fenders, headlight tints, hood pins, spoilers. You can work on the look as you work on the mechanics.

I will leave with this. If no one has done something in particular that you thought of, instead of getting discouraged, be the first person to do it! I was thinking of putting a roof rack on the LS400 but I can't decide if I really want it. Roof racks aren't my thing BUT on certain cars they look really good. I don't even have a picture to look at to see if I want it.

My car is in Phase 1. I had to make a set of phases to get my car where it needs to be. Starting at Phase 0, I hit 1 after taking care of major maintenance (timing belt, water pump, spark plugs, spark plug wires, alternator, sensors, hoses, misc.). Another requirement was that I had done some things aesthetically as well.

I bring this up for a reason. As I mentioned before, you CAN build a $40,000 custom car as long as you do it little by little. There's X amount of things I have to do to get to Phase 2 but by Phase 5, the car will either be a wagon, have a front end swap, or something else radical. If anyone has seen an LS400 wagon, please let me know! By 3 or 4, there will be a supercharger. And I know it'll take me a few years but it's fine! I love the car already.

- Rokas K.

Custom Headlights and the Future of Lexi2

Every car guy has a dream car whether it be an old Bel-Air, a Corvette Z06, supercar, or something like an old Turbo Saab. I have a dream car too but it gets a little more involved. My dream car IS the Lexus LS400. I've wanted one since the first time I saw a VIP style 400. But my history and my character in general won't let me drive a car that is like 50,000 others.

I often mention things about this project car that are years away. I hope to give you guys some inspiration but I also want to let you get into my head to try to understand why I am going about things the way I am. This is a long-term project - 10-15 years.

Having said that, I eventually want to change the trunk (wagon is the dream but we will see). The car will have a body kit for sure. But here's the thing about me. This is what drives me (no pun intended). I want to create a one-of-a-kind vehicle.

Remember, I'm teaching and doing everything myself. Sure there are things that I will need a shop to do for me but for the most part, most of the things I do to the car, I do myself.

At this point I've learned a little bit of everything. I am at the point where I can reupholster a seat and make it look good. I can paint decent - the part I did paint is still nice, flat, and shiny. I've learned to fabricate simple things. I've learned how to work with the body of the car as well as the mechanics.

This is a car that I'm keeping for life. By the time I'm done, it will be one of the most unique LS400s on the road and I can promise you that. And it will be daily driven. So keep following me because you're going to start seeing big leaps in evolution. Hitting Phase 1 was the first milestone and the car looked completely different from how it began - especially if you look at Lexi the First which, although that car made me fall in love with LS400s, gave me many headaches.

When the car hits Phase 2, it will be out if this world. The supercharger will probably be Phase 3.

The Plan

The idea behind this car is to modernize it as well as completely change the way it looks. It needs to be lowered a little bit and needs bigger wheels. I want a particular stance. The car will be maybe an inch or two lower in the front so it has that aggressive. The center console is a little outdated so that's going to be replaced by a tablet or something like that that allows you to control the AC, music, and possibly other settings.

From the outside, it needs to look completely ridiculous but in the same way a Lambo is ridiculous. Because it WILL be boosting eventually, there will be vents everywhere. (Not until then... No way.) A loud but good exhaust system.

I write down EVERY idea in a notebook. This is an easy way to make mudflaps. Eventually I will do it just to see if they will look good because then it would be worth making them. Mudflaps look great on any car. The difference with these is that they're solid, not like rally mudflaps.

Pair that with a stance where the car is lower in the front. Imagine the current fenders covering ridiculous wheels behind which is a mudflap. This not gonna be a car you have to baby. If you have to go in the dirt, haul a$#!

The goal is to make it look like that's how the car came from the factory but just have it beastly. Wide tires in the back... The whole shebang.

Of course it will have Halogen lights (which the ones in the picture above are) among any other useful modern things I can adapt. A back up camera might go in eventually along with a couple tablets in the back of the front seats for movies. (Just thought about it; backup lights are for p#ssies.)

Remember, the car is going to be reupholstered and I've fallen in love with the red and gold I've been using. I'm going to see if I can do the seats black instead of beige and at the same time do the trim like the center console in red leather. Add yellow leather to the headrests. It would only look bad if there was still a lot of the original colors were left.

The carpet can stay the same color (though it needs a deep clean or dye) along with some parts of the doors. That way, the doors flow with the carpet on the bottom but there will be black and possibly red on the doors. The rest of the interior will be reupholstered either black, red, or gold. So minor colors are yellow and red while main colors would be black and beige. This works because the interior has plenty of black and beige. It's a matter of transitioning those things.

I can't explain to you guys in words how excited I am to get this done. Of course, things like this take time. However, going back to the original subject, I'm ready to fabricate an assembly to hold the new lights in place. I think they look ridiculously good. I just hope I can figure out something nice to block the empty area. Ideally, it will be aluminum painted white so it becomes part of the body. The whole assembly will be bolted on to some part of the radiator support. It's actually a part of the frame. It shouldn't be hard to come up with something.

I've thought of a lot of things that I thought were original that turned out to have already been done before. Not this... Well yes, people have changed out the headlights in their cars before but I haven't see it on a Lexus.

- Rokas K.