Ira Senoff

I am thinking about replacing the factory element in the very near future. What are your thought on air element replacement/upgrade? My wife drives it regularly - should I k&N it or go for an intake and tell her to deal with the intake noise? The car will most likely end up mine in a year or so, she gets bored easily and will require some other car - since I have known her, this is the longest she has lasted with one car (a year this week).

Ira

RON430

Good question, particularly in light of the Weapon R group buy. Unfortunately I have a fair amount of warranty left and am not quite ready to start duking it out over mods so I will probably go with the K&N. Thought about getting the Weapon R and putting it on the shelf for a while but it looks like the group buy saves about $35 versus the possibility of some other intake doing a better job than it in the coming months. Still, the cold air box is going to be the way to go to keep the intake noise at all under control. If you are like me, the decision will be made on when you want to give up on warranty repair. If you are out of warranty, you can take your pick. If it is too loud for the wife you can always go back to stock for a while.

FD143

iTrader: (1)

Ron that was my first question but according to the members here replacing the air cleaner ***. with a low restriction unit will not void your warranty.

Fernando.

RON430

Thanks for the info but I don't remember reading any posts about lack of warranty problems with aftermarket intakes. Please let me know the link if I am wrong here or anyone has any first hand knowledge. The K&N is a drop in and is generally acknowledged as equal to if not superior to OEM units. The intake is a different story. I believe it calls for removing and reinstalling the air flow sensor as well as depending on the cone filter for all filtering. I think the odds are small of either 1) an engine problem or 2) an engine problem related to the intake but if the worst happens and Lexus decided not to warrant the engine, I am not sure you have much of a leg to stand on, particularly if you replace the ECU with the Weapon R (or whoever) chip with the updated mapping for the intake. From reading the posts on the group buy it also sounds like the intake does not currently have CARB approval so it might not pass smog here. I doubt that the engine would emit more but any non-CARB approved part can cause you to fail. Once had a Z28 that passed the emissions test get a fail because I had changed the position of the cats. With around 5K miles on my GS I still think I will wait until the warranty is over or at least closer to being over and double check that the intakes are CARB approved. Then there is the issue of the upcoming Weapon R Dragon filter for use with V8s, $35 might just not be enough inducement for me for now.

Murph

Ira,

I recently purchased a CPO 99 GS400 from Ira Lexus in the Boston area and like most of the CL members I feel the need to enhance the vehicle. I spoke with the the specialist at the dealership who works with folks like us. His business card has the moniker " Lexus Certified Master" on it so I am assuming his info is correct. He told me that I am OK with the Lexus warranty as long as they do the mods with the parts they reccommend. In addition they will warranty the install for 12 months/12K miles.

He recommended the TRD intake ( same as RMM according to him) and the L-Tuned exhaust to be done together. Kind of a "breathe in -breathe out" operation if I wanted to realize the benefits of the intake.

You may want to check with your local Lexus dealer as well. I hope this info is helpful.

Murph


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RON430

Hey Murph - Great info. I am going in for the 5K service this weekend, think I'll talk with the service rep about mods. Didn't know TRD had an intake for the GS as well.

garnet92

Ira – I had the K&N filter in the stock air box in my SC400 – there was little noticeable difference in noise – it’s not nearly as loud as one of the aftermarket intakes. I doubt that your wife will detect any difference.

And reference the warranty: I think that it’s going to depend on the practices of the dealer. My dealer (Sewell Lexus of Dallas) hasn’t tried to weasel out of warranty repairs because of my “improvements”. Of course, they’ve installed all of the L-Tuned stuff. They had also installed Borla exhaust on my old SC400.

I had an issue with a Check Engine light recently, and while it indicated a vapor recovery problem, my SRT intake, splicing in the ecu, etc. was never an issue (I installed this, they didn’t.) They also liked the debadged trunk. I specifically asked about what impact the SRT intake would have on warranty and was told “don’t worry about it”.

From what I’ve seen on this forum, some dealerships will look for any excuse to refuse warranty – the majority will honor warranty unless the item itself is related to the cause of the problem.

SandRock

I just got my SRT in, it kinda makes you think. I get my 25k service on Monday so I will install on Sat.

Percy

Ira,

It all depends on the dealership. If they threaten to VOID the warranty because of a filter assembly or filter, make sure you get the reason IN WRITING, thus creating a paper trail which you can take them to court on. Moss Magnuson of '87 Act will not allow a dealership to void a warranty unless it's PROVEN that the aftermarket part is the cause of any problems. Simply bolting on an aftermarket assembly DOES NOT void the warranty according to Moss Magnuson of '87.

The act was really needed since some dealerships (possibly GM/Dodge, others) were voiding warranties for having different tires on the car. It got really stupid.

Percy

SandRock

Mo told me the same thing.