Hi guys,

For a while now I have wanted to enhance the interior of my 97 Es by installing a wood grain dash kit (for the vents, glovebox, radio, climate control), but I'm faced with a HUGE, HUGE problem - I have an AUSTRALIAN ES model (RHS drive) with a different factory radio compared to the USA model and Lexus never made a wood grain kit for it!!

I only have the darker factory wood trim on the centre console, ashtray, and door switches only.

I have found some places on the internet that do RHS dash kits and I could get pieces for the vents, glove box, and overhead switches but obviously no pieces will fit my radio.

Any ideas? I have thought about just ordering a RHS kit from the USA and just installing some of the pieces that will fit, but I think it could look silly without trim on the radio. Does anyone know if there are places that will make a custom one? I guess I could try to trace out a pattern from my radio?

Here's a picture of my radio - at least it's unique in it's own special way I guess!



I'm thinking I might just buy a wood trim kit and install the glovebox piece only.

Lex Es300

 

You could just put a us spec one in and it would fit. Or you could get a 01-00 US spec radio since it already has the wood grain on it. Or you could make your own i've seen it done here a few times with aftermarket setups but i think it would be very hard to do with the stock setup.

 

Wow, that looks crazy backwards...

BTW, the 00-01 radio is different, different plugs on the back. I had to replace the one in my `98 (LCD was broken) and I found plenty of 00+ radios, took me about 3 months to finally find a `97-`99 that was reasonably priced. And even then, it had been water damaged through the tape player, so I just stole the LCD and put it in mine...

Good luck! You might try a vinyl place or search ebay for just a sheet of wood grain, then cut it out yourself or take the sheet to a vinyl shop and see if they can cut it with your pattern...

 

^This most likely can be fixed with a new wireing harness or just redoing it yourself the wiring diagram is everywhere in this forum.