This weekend I drove up to William Rau Autowood in Los Angeles and spoke with Bill about my Lexus SC400. I thought the information I received was worth sharing with the Lexus community. I have a ’93 and after 10 years, the sun is starting to make some of the sections of wood on the front of the dash look a little “milky”. It is only noticeable in bright sun, but I thought I’d see if he could re-stain my trim pieces.

The first thing Bill did when he saw my car was to take a long time inspecting my wood and leather steering wheel done by American Stitches. He was pretty impressed with the job they did, especially for the price (group buy is running at around $450). As a side note, he said he could do a similar wheel, for about $450-500, but he usually tries to use the factory leather, which would be a problem for most of us. He also does not do the fake burl effect to the wood, so if you want real burl it would be big bucks. I think for most Clublexus members, the American Stitches wheel is the way to go.

As for the dash pieces I wanted refinished, he spent a long time thinking about what it would take and said: “about 10 hours at $85 an hour.” That’s right, $850 to re-stain and re-finish the wood pieces. This does not include any labor to take the pieces in or out – he does not do this. I was very surprised at how expensive this was. He said he had to strip off the current coating with chemicals and/or heat. Bill was very apprehensive about doing the project as well because he does not have much experience with Lexus cars (mostly Rolls Royce, Bentley, Aston Martin, and Range Rover). I gave him the naive question as to why I couldn’t just sand the pieces and stain and finish them myself. He went on to explain that ALL cars the last 40 or so years have used wood laminates instead of solid wood pieces (except steering wheels and some shifters). This laminate is usually thin and can easily be damaged. I couldn’t believe the “all car” part, so asked him about my Range Rover, where the pieces look like thick blocks of wood on the doors. He took me back in his shop and showed me the exact piece I was talking about. He flipped it over and I was surprised to see it was hollow with a metal backing. Bill proved me wrong. This made my decision pretty easy – be happy with what I have, or find the pieces at a salvage yard.

The last thing I discussed with him was laminating the pieces in the center consol. The two pieces in question are the piece around the shifter and the ashtray cover. These pieces were done in wood in ‘98+ cars with the gated shifter, as we all know. Many people, including myself, have thought about using the pieces from the stick on wood kits, but have had some reservations about color match and quality. He said he could do the job (if you gave him your pieces, i.e. no Lexus parts included) for about $600. If you wanted the small holes cut out that have the red indicator lights (the ones that show the shifter position), he would have to send it out to a machine shop to do the fine cuts. He estimated the machine shop would charge $100 to $150. Therefore, to do everything better than a factory job, you could have it done for about $700 to $750. This seemed like the only thing halfway worth doing for the price. The next question I asked you can all imagine – what if I got 5 or so others to do the job at the same time? His response was that there really weren’t great economies of scale to what he was doing. If he did 5 or more at the same time, he could only get the price down to $500, “$450 at the very lowest.” He said the machine shop on the other hand would be a different story and doing several would be a huge benefit. The bottom line here is: plan on spending at least $700 if you go it alone, and probably $500+ best case with several people participating. I found this a bit tempting, but it is still a little high for what I wanted to spend.

I just thought I’d pass along the information; as the discussion of interior wood comes up fairly frequently on the forum. Some of you may be interested. I walked away with a bit of shock over how steep the price was to play, but if you have the money, these guys can do whatever you can dream up!

Ryan

 

Looks like your trim is suffering from blushing. Film looks whitish, cloudy, or milky. This is moisture trapped in the surface of the lacquer from the atmosphere.

I have not tried this but I heard it works. Use at your own risk.

White blotches or Rings:
This condition is the result of moisture being trapped under a film of wax or the finish itself.
First try cleaning to remove the wax buildup and see if the problem goes away.
If after cleaning the white area remains it means that it is under the coating itself and will require a little more effort.
Try these remedys in the order shown.
1. Try rubbing a little toothpaste on the area using a soft cloth, wipe off and dry. Still there? then
2. Using the appropiate thinner for the finish you have, dampen a small square of cloth and slowly pass it over the area as close to the surface as you can without touching it. The fumes from the dampened cloth will open up the surface of the finish and allow the moisture to escape.
3. Still there? Now we have to get serious, take a piece of 600 grit sandpaper and lightly sand the area, when the surface is dulled out well take your solvent dampened cloth and make several passes over the damaged area, the white "blushing" will disappear. Allow to dry well for an hour or so and then apply a light coat of paste wax to seal off the repaired area. In extreme cases you may have to work the damaged area with the solvent and a piece of 0000 steel wool but only use steel wool if the dampened cloth is not working.

Use the old fashioned toothpaste without coloring and definitely not a gel. This step actually might not work since the water is probably in the stain.

Of course use a test area that is not as noticable.

Also wax those surfaces well with multiple coats and then wax it occasionally.

 

glad to see that i am not the only one doing this project. i have been talking to bill for 6mnths now,and i am going to send him my wood pieces this week to come up with a custom color(marbalized like the new Ls 430 and sc430"(comes with the ecru leather)".i really like this color and will be working w/bill to come up with something similiar ,maybe like the color in this jag wheel!

 

Hey Hermosa,
Where did you get that? Was it for solid wood furniture or for veneers? My fear is that the veneer is so thin that this could kill both the veneer and the substrate it is attached to.

Nextlevel,
Glad to see you are working with Bill as well. That is a cool color on the wheel you posted. Please ask him some questions about the wood once he has it. I would really like to understand how thick/solid it is so I could determine what is possible (i.e. sanding). I assume he plans to remove all the veneer and put on something custom? Did you get a price to do that? I would like to get my hands on an extra piece from a wreck and do some testing of my own. BTW, Bill did an amazing Pearl for the SC430. He was going to make a standard kit, but to get the navigation cover wood panel, you have to buy a navigation system! Thus the only alternative is to do a custom job on a car with it's parts stripped. He typically buys all the wood pieces for a particular car (mainly RR and Aston), then strips the wood veneer and adds his own, thus keeping 100% OEM parts from a fit standpoint.

 

Veneer, dont go too far. Just release the moisture.

 

You're in Alabama? And drove to Los Angeles?
Where is William Rau Autowood?

 

Ryan, I too have spoken to William Rau a while ago when I was looking for steering wheel vendors and honestly, for a couple piece of wood, it's not worth the money IMO...I think the wood steering wheel adds just enough wood to the interior...if I had gated shifter, I would probably get the wood shift **** from a SC430 but outside of that, I'm not really into too much wood....I think the GS430 has just enough...

Man, if I had black or grey leather, I would do a Carbon Fiber install instead...but since I have tan, my choices are very limited...my friend's dad is a old school (from "Mother Russia") wood worker...I wonder if he could offer any suggestions...I suppose you could just replace the veener stuff with real solid wood (just contour it the same)....hmmm....

Eh, I'm going to save my money for a 2JZ-GTE swap instead...

 

What, you don't just drive across the country on a casual Sunday afternoon? LOL I think the profiles got reset and they put me down as Alabama - Go 205 baby!

I live in Irvine CA, so it was less than an hour away. I guess I better fix my profile now.

 

It is just a finish printed on metal to look like wood.

 

What is? All the pieces in my SC400 are real wood veneers what are you refering to?

 

Ok Ryan, I was worried that you commuted from AL to Irvine EVERYDAY!

 

Who told you that? I've seen the wood trim pieces off the car and there is real wood grain in it.

All these projects are intriguing, but I think the most practical method is to find an immaculate SC that's been totalled and strip every last piece of usable material from it, sell the rest.

 

I have taken my wood parts off my '92 SC400 and I can CONFIRM that it's REAL WOOD. It's actually unfinished on the backside....

kschwenk - You must be thinking of Acura or some Infinitis....they use wood grain "simluated" plastic..(Acura especially...no wonder no one thinks of them as "Luxury"...)