Friday, November 02, 2007 - 11:09 am, by: Mike Beck(Gold_40gt)
Ive been looking around for Video Reviews of the 1st gen celsiors, ads and written reviews from places like Car and Driver.
Anyone seen these sorts of things on the Net? There have been a few things on You Tube but they arent overly interesting. Just hoping theres more to see.
Post a Link up if you do know of something thats worth reading or watching.
Saturday, November 03, 2007 - 06:40 pm, by: Greg Nikitiuk(Jestr)
From Auto speed When I told people I was thinking of buying myself a Lexus LS400, there were several common reactions - all negative.
But most of the comments showed that many people simply didn't know the details of the car. For example, of course the 1998 LS400 would be a helluva lot heavier and larger than a contemporary HSV VT Commodore, wouldn't it?
But the LS400 weighs in at 1794kg, the HSV GTS Commodore at 1740 - that's a difference of just 3 per cent. (Though that of course depends on the Commodore model selected.) And size? Well, compared again with the Commodore, the Lexus is 111mm (4.3 inches) longer, but is actually 15mm shorter and 12mm narrower! Not much in it is there? Obviously it is the styling that makes the car look large, rather than the actual dimensions. The Lexus even has a smaller turning circle than the Commodore - by 0.6 metres!
And performance? Well, Wheels magazine in their April 1998 issue recorded a fairly typical (two-up, half tank of fuel) 0-100 time of 7.5 seconds - not blisteringly fast but obviously quicker than a lot of cars, including all the contemporary 5-litre HSV models tested by the same magazine... And power and torque? With 209kW and 398Nm it's almost line-ball with the larger engine 4.3 litre Mercedes E430 V8, very close to the even larger 4.4-litre BMW V8 - and when looked at on a V8 kilowatt/litre basis, only the Jaguar 4-litre V8 beats it. The Holden and Ford V8s are of course way behind.
Fuel consumption? It's always hard to assess consumption with a level playing field, but using the government AS2877 figures as indicative for comparison purposes, with highway/city figures of 7.6 and 12 litres/100 km it beats cars like the smaller BMW 540i (8.5 and 13), Mercedes E430 (7.8 and 13.5) and even Honda's much slower and less powerful Legend (9.5 and 13). Again only the Jaguar's efficient 4-litre XJ8 comes close, with 7.4 and 12.5. Fast forwarding to 2001 models, it's just slightly worse than the 3.8-litre Holden Statesman (7.4 and 12) and of course much better than the Holden versions with the supercharged six and 5.7 litre V8 (8.5 and 13.5).
Of course, you can pick whatever comparison cars you want to make another one look good, but the bottom line is that the LS400 is quicker, smaller and much thriftier on fuel than people often suppose. That doesn't make it a small car that gets 7 litres/100 everywhere and wipes everything off the road in performance, but by no means is it a huge and heavy barge that drinks like a fish!
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