Been active on the Forum a few year now but never started my own thread and I figured now is the time. I have to play a bit of catching up and storytelling because I purchased the GX back in Feb 22.
Slight backstory. I owned an F150 prior that was an absolute lemon. Bought it new and had issues day one. Ford was fine but the dealerships were terrible. The truck was also not the easiest to maintain when I started learning how to do my own maintenance after seeing how terrible the dealers were and learning what vehicles actually need. Turns out lifetime fluids are a load of crap along with 10k+ mile oil changes.
This experience led me to Toyota/Lexus and I jumped on the GX/LX bandwagon pretty fast. Parents ownd a 1st Gen Sequoia when I was growing up so it was kinda ironic I was looking for another 2UZ vehicle all these years later. Should have bought the Sequoia off of them when they downsized but I was young and nieve. Funny enough my brother has a 1st Gen 2UZ Tundra so it's a family thing.
My search was for a 2UZ LX or GX around 100k miles or less and relatively stock. Found my now GX on Craigslist from PO #3 who was obviously flipping it and new how desirable GXs are. She was just shy of 97k miles and had the timing belt and water pump done 3k miles earlier. All the major maintenance records from PO #2 & 3 were available and she was a California car seemingly garaged most of her life.
What I say next might make some of you want to vomit but remember how crazy used car prices were back in 2021-2022 because of the pandemic. This is also in California, land of expensive everything. I thankfully no longer reside there. I ended up paying $23k for the GX and I don't regret that for a second. I'm sure I'll catch a few knifes from yall for paying that much and I will be the first to agree there are better deals on GXs out there.
PO #1 ended up being an oil drilling company in Central California and I assume she was an executives car. Maybe she had seen some dirt roads getting out to desert oil wells or maybe she was a straight up business tax right off that crawled the parking lot. I like to think the former so I returned her to her natural habitat a few weeks after purchase.
All of my local wheeling buddies are now Jeep guys too! Not a lot of Toyotas and almost no Lexus vehicles in my corner of the state. Glad you started a build thread!
My first bit of customization to the GX was removing the badges from the rear tail gate. It's also at this time I realized the PO used a spray on tint on all the rear lights.
Mine has that too. Apparently there is a LED back there that will burn out. There are a few shops that will go through the cluster to replace the soldered-on LEDs and motors for the gauges. I may ship mine out at some point in the future.
Mine has that too. Apparently there is a LED back there that will burn out. There are a few shops that will go through the cluster to replace the soldered-on LEDs and motors for the gauges. I may ship mine out at some point in the future.
It use to bother me slightly but it's now on the list of things I've accepted on this aging vehicle. Curious how @Jstawgn new dash turns out even though I like analog gauge clusters.
It took a few weeks after getting the GX to discover a periodic clattering noise coming from the engine bay. Eventually realized it only happened when the HVAC was on and a patient observance of the AC compressor revealed when the compressor clutch engaged it was in fact producing the clattering. I was early in my maintenance experience and this was going to be too much for me. I also didn't have a second vehicle at the time adding to my decision see what the Lexus dealership experience was like.
As I mentioned previously, I came from a bad relationship with a lemon Ford and the dealerships experiences were infuriating. Well Lexus did not disappoint and I was shocked to learn I get a brand new loaner while they have the GX and I can keep it up to 48 hours after they finish along with no mileage limit. Yes I know they are enticing me to buy a new car but this is head and shoulders better then the 1 of 4 Ford dealerships that all they could do is give me a car pool ride back home with a driver that smells like Marlboro Reds. I appreciate being taken care of for the price I was paying, and boy did I pay.
An inspection revealed the AC compressor was a previous maintenance hack job and needed to be replaced. I also had a torn CV axle boot, and missing splash guards. I obviously said a big no thanks to the quoted $400ish for the splash guards. But I did agree to the new AC compressor and CV axle. I later learned I should have forced them to reboot the axle instead of full replacement. But my biggest regret was not getting my old axle back. I could have had a beautiful spare to reboot myself but I was not on the forum at the time and ignorant to these lessons. Both those jobs came out to $2,500 and I don't even have a spare axle to show for it. I was leaning the hard way that I better start learning to do my own maintenance like I wanted, but I still had one more dealership trip to go. At least that brand new ES350 loner didn't suck
I had at least been doing my own oil changes every 5k and I wanted to replace every fluid close to the 100k mile mark to have a nice baseline. I started with the diffs and transfer case which is a job I've done before on a previous truck. Got to say I love the drain plug on the rear diff because it's a hell of a lot cleaner and easier then prying one open. I used the cheap leaky ketchup pump from the you name it autofarts store to fill the diffs and that was an experience I didn't want to repeat in 30k miles. I found a better solution I'll share in a later post. I also had not leaned about the weak front diff fill plug. No issues when removing it but when I was torqueing it down at the end it ever so slightly stared to strip out. I decided this was a latter me problem and that it was good and tight enough. I believe it was this incident that lead me to an IH8MUD post discussing the better OEM replacement fill plug with the socket head. This Forum has become my saving grace and entertainment ever since.
It use to bother me slightly but it's now on the list of things I've accepted on this aging vehicle. Curious how @Jstawgn new dash turns out even though I like analog gauge clusters.
Don't get it yet. I just realized my air bag fault indicator is on. Code is B1628 which means it did not see the RSCA off indicator circuit that is part of the gauge cluster. If this is not resolved, this thing is totally unsafe as it potentially impact the while SRS system.
My last dealership experience came a few months after the first. I wanted to replace the brake, power steering and transmission fluid along with the filter but I ran out of time when my house sold faster then I expected.
I learned a valuable lesson with the "service advisor" on this trip. If you ask them to flush the transmission and change the filter and the advisor responds with, "Oh your vehicle dosent have a transmission filter." It's probably a sign you should just leave and go somewhere that knows what they are doing. But I instead gave him a part number and showed him the A750F 100% has a filter. Instead of admitting he sucks at his job he said, "well we don't change them, their good forever." You didn't even know it existed 30 seconds ago so don't tell me you dont change them. I decided to aquire the OEM parts for them to install. But then I question whether they flushed it properly like I asked or just did a drain and fill. This was the nail in the coffin for with dealerships if I can avoid it.
Along with the brake fluid all the pads and rotors were replaced also. If I would have known about the GX460 upgrade I would have done that.
Even though paying the dealer wasnt fun all the fluids were fresh at basically 100k miles and gave me a nice baseline to move forward with.
Those previous dealership trips strengthened my resolve to do my maintenance myself. So I picked up the entire series of Lexus repair manuals. It's written for a technician so it is not step by step and assumes you know how to perform certain tasks. It's not perfect but it sure has been nice being able to access torque specs and other truth data. If anyone wants something specific from the manuals just let me.
Made a few interior upgrades for some of the aging vehicle quirks. First, I'm a good American who drinks large beverages so the stock cuplolders were useless. JW Off Road make this cup holder solution that does the job. I painted it to match the dark brown. Rust-Oleum anodized bronze matches almost perfectly. It was a loose fit so I used museum putty in the corners to hold it down and it hasn't moved since.
I'm also using this dash mount from Ohana Rig Supply. It utilizes adhesive and 4 screws for mounting and you don't need to remove any of the dash or trim to install. My wife has snapped 2 plastic RAM ball mounts because the dash mount is so solid and her misunderstanding of how much a lever increases force. I have since swapped to metal RAM ball mounts. The phone is our navigation and media so having a good mount was essential. I also painted it similarly to the cupholder to blend into the dash better. You'll see chips and imperfections because these pictures are nearly 3 years afrer inatall.
If you have VVTI GX I would highly recommend getting a ScanGuage or some device to read and clear codes. It's well documented throughout the Forum that the SAIS that all VVTI GXs have is a weak point.
When my SAIS started acting up I was happy to have my ScanGuage 2 to verify the code and clear it out. It's also been reasuring to see my coolant and trans temps real time. Having a more accurate rang/fuel calculation has allowed me to more confidently stretch the legs on the thirsty girl as well. The mount I have can be easily found on Etsy.
Planning on bypassing the SAIS? My homebrew bypass has been working pretty well. Glad we are in MO with no emissions inspections and pretty lax safety inspections to deal with.
I have since swapped to metal RAM ball mounts. The phone is our navigation and media so having a good mount was essential. I also painted it similarly to the cupholder to blend into the dash better. You'll see chips and imperfections because these pictures are nearly 3 years afrer inatall.
