Lex Do It! OG's '98 LX 470

[OG 91 LC]

What up fellas!!!!

I went for it!!! Here's my new-to-me 1998 Lexus LX 470 in Smokey Mica.

Before the purchase. AHC on H.

And after. AHC on N.

The truck has always been a SoCal vehicle.
Originally leased from Lexus Mission Viejo. Second owner from National City San Diego purchased the truck in late 2001.

Current mileage is 94k miles.
No 90k service.

Extensive Lexus dealership maintenance records up until 70k.

Purchase price was $10,500.

I have two 80s. My wife, friends, and neighbors think I have the sickness.

I love these vehicles and I love to learn as much as I can about them.

Thanks for all those of you who chimed in on the AHC concerns I had.

I'm new to the 100 series. Eager to learn.

Al

 

[Lowbudgetlc100]

Nice find

 

[Todrn55]

Welcome! I'm in the 1998 lx club too. AHC present and accounted for....on the way out at 175k. Going with Oem suspension soon.

Enjoy!!

Todd H

 

[ylexot]

Glad you got that deal worked out! Welcome to the LX chapter of the hundy party. (And yes, you clearly have the sickness, and you have lots of company here, as you know.)

 

[ranma21]

Nice looking rig with low miles, nice score.

 

[Traskew3]

Howdy & Welcome from a fellow low mileage 98 LX-er!!

 

[2003lx470]

I have two 80s. My wife, friends, and neighbors think I have the sickness.

Only cure for this sickness is "MORE" (i was thinking more cow bells on SNL)

 

[Slickspawn]

I'd love an LX. With working ahc for a daily driver!

 

[jhanley]

And, you have a Prius. Guess the tree-hugers won't be egging your house.

Great find!

 

[OG 91 LC]

I had some time this morning to do the $0 dollar mods to the LX.

Removed running boards.

Used a lil' dental floss to remove some of the gold bling badging. Used some Goof Off for the adhesive.

Removed and rattle canned the front badge.

Slow and steady.

 

[OG 91 LC]

Mo' betta without the running boards.

 

[Traskew3]

Lookin Good!! Those were the first "Free" mods I did too, including painting the front badge and the rear one. I was able to gently pull the "L" off the back and reuse the adhesive by heating it with a heat gun after i painted it black. That gold junk had to go!!

 

[OG 91 LC]

Continued with my $0 mods. I was able to pull the "L" badging at the rear of the truck. Rattle canned all my badging and put them back on the truck.

I also have been dealing with front end issues. It tends to pull to the left and I get the shakes and steering wobbles over 60+ mph. I knew of the issue when I bought the truck. I suspected wheel bearings.

So I decided to lift the drivers side front end using my bottle jack.

Here is the correct bottle Jack placement.

Front end lifted.

I grabbed the wheel at 12 and 6. Sure enough there was significant play. I'll be tackling this next week.

 

[OG 91 LC]

So as it turns out the front end pulling to the left, shakes, and wobbles after speeds of 60+ mph were due to front bearings being slightly loose (they got dialed) and the really bad Dunlop A/Ts tires that came with the truck when I purchased it. It was recommended not to drive the truck on the hwy.

So I went looking for either tires that would fit the 16" chromies or a whole new set of 16" or 18" each wheels with tires. For the price and availability I was able to find 18" wheels off a 2008 LC. I was really hoping to find a set of wheels off another LX to keep the visual aesthetics legit. I just couldn't find a set. These will do for now until I find a LX set.
Once again the bottle Jack came in handy. Lifted each corner at a time. Removed and installed.

So here is my LX with 18" LC wheels that came with 285/60/18 Yokohama Geolanders. A before and after.

I do have the center caps. I was eager to take them on a road test. It was rad!!!!! No crazy shakes and wobbles. No pulling to the left. I drove on the hwy at 75+ mph and it was a solid drive. On to the next items.

I have been reading on how to bleed the AHC system and adding in new fluids. I'm still a little sketchy about the procedure. I have to read a bit more. That's what I will be tacking next.

I'm also thinking about removing the factory roof rack. I want to eventually have a rack that I may swap between my '96 80 series and my LX to take the RTT. It needs to be able to attach gutter mounts for the 80 and whatever mounts the 100 series needs. I will be researching for this.

 

[Ok29445]

Nice LX! My 2000 LX had 207k when I bought it, still runs great. I ditched the AHC and put in OEM LC coils, torsion bars up front and new KYB shocks.

 

[OG 91 LC]

Well. Looking to get my chrome wheels powder coated this week and getting some 285/75/16 BF Goodies on them. So before I get my wheel setup I decided to do AHC maintenance. I had received 1 full can and a third of a second can for free. So I took a little time this Sunday afternoon to bleed and add new AHC fluid on the LX.

I'll post this up for my visual people. I'm a teacher and a visual learner and I'm big on making things visual for my students.

So I decided to turn the truck on and drop the suspension into Low. I took a cooking baster and took out as much fluid from the reservoir as possible into a plastic bottle.

Man I actually thought my fluid was clear, but when I took it out and put it in the clear bottle it looked like this:

Once all the old fluid was out of the reservoir I added an entire can of AHC fluid into the reservoir.

So I followed instructions to bleed the acumulator first. This is how I set it up. I used a clear 64 oz bottle from TJs and drilled a small enough hole at the top to get my hose through nice and tight. I bought clear hose, shoot I forgot the diameter, it's on the AHC thread, from TrueValue. They had the most variety and it was about $2+ for the length needed. Here is the bottle and hose set up.

Before bleeding, since I now had a full can of AHC fluid in the reservoir, I turned the truck on and set the height setting to neutral. This drew in fresh new fluid into the system. I was ready to bleed.

 

[OG 91 LC]

I followed the bleeding instructions and bled the accumulator first. Accumulator is on the drivers side between front and rear door. Here's the accumulator, bottle, and hose set up.

i opened it up using my 10mm box wrench that's in my tool bag in with the bottle Jack.
The fluid was dirty and gray.

Btw. When I bled the accumulator I was waiting for the drivers side of the truck to drop. It didn't. I closed the nut and valve when I saw clear AHC fluid coming down the hose.

Before I went to bleed the front driver's side I turned the truck on and let the AHC system draw fresh fluid from the reservoir.

 

[OG 91 LC]

I then proceeded to bleed the front driver's side. I attached the hose to the valve. Opened it up very slowly and the front of the truck dropped very slowly. To be honest I thought that the drivers side front only was going to drop , but the entire front dropped evenly.

Once again before I bled the rear driver's side I turned on the truck and I let the AHC system draw fresh fluid from the reservoir.


I did the same for the rear driver's side and the entire rear side of the truck dropped slowly and evenly.

 

[OG 91 LC]

Once I was done with drivers front and rear i followed the same steps for the passenger side. By this time I was mindful of how much fresh fluid was in the reservoir. I checked and made sure the reservoir had not dropped below the min level.

After bleeding accumulator, drivers side, and passenger rear I had accumulated this much old dirty fluid in my 64 oz bottle.

By this time I decided to add some more fluid from the second can that I had just to make sure that levels in the reservoir didn't get too low. If I ended up with too much AHC fluid in the reservoir when I was done I thought I would just use the baster to get it to the right level.

After accumulator and all four ends the bottle was full.

I was pretty stoked that after all the bleeding the AHC fluid in the reservoir was right at the max. Cool. I left it at that level because if you notice there is the standard suspension rake to the stance on the truck. The reservoir indicates max level on the front, but it indicates min on the rear. Take a look on the side of the reservoir. You'll see what I mean.

Overall, pretty straight forward. It took about an hour to do this job.

Now to dispose of the AHC fluid properly.

I hope this helps some of you fellas that have been putting this off or you first timers.

 

[Drogon]

I need to do this as well. Thanks for the great write up!
Was there a noticeable difference in the ride after the fluid swap?