And after the first week, I like it.

So, something's binding when cold - got to be easy to jack it up and see which wheel is sticking if any?

Alternatives - prop shaft bearings, diff? (stick on axle stands, run with wheels in air, see if there's still the binding?)

That's what the garage that sold it me is for. This isn't a £100 get it home and fix the bits, this is £4k and get them to sort it.

Even if I tell them with a fair level of certainty the salesman who I dealt with (independant not franchise so no service desk) will ignore everything I say when he relays it to the mechanics.

Seat of pants suggestions something sticking when cold, front dipping when coasting to a stop very slightly suggests brakes at front.

I've paid for the privilege of them gettin their hands dirty, not me. An MOT roller would probably help them determine if any brake is sticking, but not why.

Yup - exactly. Hope you get it sorted.

Out of interest, what sort of mpg are you getting out of it?

First week, with a few days driving it everywhere arround town (because you always do), then heavier than normal traffic because I've been a lazy bastard and lying in for an hour, then a few trips to the data centre (I'll claim them back because the jeep is off the road for work), with the sticking brake(or whatever), and the under inflated tyres.

Actually works out not much more than the Saab though when 5p a litre cheaper, and less likely to break down too.

I'm going to keep an eye and see how much difference the problem, and the underinflated tyres actually make.

But the handling is nice and sharp, seats loverly, comfortable, aircon works when it is supposed to and so does the rear screen demister.

Apparently using snow mode on a longish cruise can make upto 10mpg difference, because the flybywire alters the throttle response/opening and injector duty cycle so you still end up maintaining the same speed, but it does it more efficiently, you just can't drop a cog a floor it, because flooring it doesn't wang the the butterfly open.

Going to run a dose of fuel injector cleaner through, check the air filter (only two year change on official service) and have a look at the plugs. It has done 80k so worth checking even if all good.

I get the impression Carl could be very irritating to them if they don't :-) I know I would be too if I'd spent 4k on a car.

Err..might be able to shed a bit of light on this.

At Howdens Kitchens, they had a DAF 95XF that did the same - wobbled from a certain speed like the equivalent of a high speed wheelbalance wobble. Some days it'd do it, others it wouldn't and it would appear from around 45MPH onwards when it did then inexplicably stop for no reason and be fine the rest of the day. Was in and out the dealers and they couldn't find anything wrong with it at all. Nothing wrong with the steering, the brakes or the bushes. Even had a full set of 8 new tyres, which is the thick end of £2000 on one of those, and it still did it. It progressed where it'd do it every day then there'd be a little bang and it'd be OK after that for the day. Eventually it progressed until it would do it all the time.

I was the unlucky one who found the source. As I was approaching Junction 37, M62, travelling down Ouse Bridge using the engine braking, there was an almighty bang followed by a regular bang bang bang speed related noise until I stopped.

On getting out and crawling underneath, the yoke that carried the centre propshaft bearing had parted company with the chassis. I didn't find out the cause but at least it narrowed it down to where the fault lay - either in the prop or what was at either end.

Hope that may be of some help to you.

Damned right. If it two complaints I wanted sorting to make the deal (the paint chips on the bonnet) and the steering wobble aren't sorted by the time the 1 month warranty they give for free gets close to ending, I shall reject the car as being fit for purpose and of merchantable quality. Their loss and I get my money back. I don't want to do that though as I do like it.

Cheers Conor. I've found out since buying that it seems be a common ish problem with ISs of arround 99-01, and the cause can be any of my suspects. Having felt it through the seat my thoughts were trans/prop related, but the braking dip kind of put that to the back of my mind, unless the prop is dragging on something slightly over-run of course which might feel slightly like a brake.

One other possible that people haven't mentioned is an alloy out of true. I had that happen on the Exploder after that dim bitch ran into it in a head-on. The repairer didn't pick it up as a fault and it seemed to drive OK when took it out for a low-speed drive after the car was fixed. However on the motorway there was a nasty vibration across a narrow range of road speeds. I thought it was either a badly balanced wheel or tracking. I had both done and it didn't improve, I was stumped and asked my local garage to have a look at it. They noticed when trying to balance the tyre that the wheel was very slightly (a mm or so) out of true so although it was balanced, it was wobbling left/right by a tiny amount. I changed the wheel and the problem went away. Sadly I couldn't get my money for a new alloy back since the insurers reckoned settlement was full and final and that it was just a coincidence that dim bich had run into that wheel hard enough to snap the wishbone.

Its possible, although hopefully not. The wheels were replaced at some point under the Lexus warranty by the first owner because of corossion and are spot on, whould be a shame to change the, as I would need to get a cheap set of pikey aftermarkets and these are loverly Lexus 17" originals.

%steve%@malloc.co.uk (Steve Firth) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying:

Why would a bent rim or out-of-round tyre "go away" once up to speed and temp, and not come back for the rest of the journey?

Dunno. With mine it only affected steering over a narrow range of road speeds. IIRC it was bad at about 50-55 mph, then died down to be ing unnoticeable at 70 and didnt come back until the speedo was registering close to 100 at which point it was simply bloody scary.

So I sued to find that I noticed it when setting out on a journey then it "went away" once I was about seven miles from home an off NSL roads and anto DC/motorway. Then I didn't experience it again as I cruised along until I got to journey's end. Sometimes I didn't experience it at all until the next day since vibration under deceleration seemed to be lesser than vibration when accelerating.

Simply raising it as yet another possibility.

Easily explained by a couple of slow punctures / leaky valves?

Older alloys corrode and the tyres then don't always seat right either... isn't that right MrH. (1)

Any idea how long it stood on the forecourt before you bought it?

(1) The VFR was like that til I had the tyres removed and the rims cleaned up.

Yup, true.

You also should have seen how hard they had to hit the inner face with a blunt rubber implement to get the rears off the 156....

At some point in the history it had all 4 wheels replaced under warranty and the warranty extended a year. And it has had about 3 sets of tyres. Apart from now they are covered in brake dust crap, the wheels look brand new. And according to the stock card which I looked at while the salesman wasn't there, it had been in for 3 weeks.

Add in the brake drag/shudder that i'm sure the ecu is detecting as knock (have you ever shifted up to top gear and planted your foot on the motorway at 50 and had the speed drop off as the side to side shake through the steering wheel got enough to make the whole car shimmy so you had to shift down a gear just to maintain speed on the flat then 5 minutes later be able to accelerate as normal in a RWD car).

Sounds like a right shonky old dog to me.... Sure that mileage is right, and wasn't missing a '1'?

We have a loan from Alison's mum which is to be paid back before they retire, so it is going into the ISA.

It has just about every option available for the IS in SE spec, apart from the second CD changer. The only wear you can find is the gearknob (a chrome ball) is quite badly scratched from a wedding ring. All the leather/alcantera is mint, no sags or stretches, and the leather steering wheel and pedal covers are spotless, no sign of the 80k miles it has done.

Yes... your point being?

Very nice... but the options rarely count value wise on older cars.

I dread to think what you'd get to replace it pound for pound, if you needed to sell it to get something more economical later on.