Lexus GS test drive since 2012 sedan

Hybrid car overview Lexus GS 450h

Type of car hybrid
Well, apparently, in Toyota, they considered that it was time to launch its main trump cards - this is what thought came to my mind when I was driving the new Lexus GS450H car. Indeed, this summer, it is planned to start the implementation of the LS lineup, which, as is commonly believed, is the flagship of the Lexus brand. At least, all the forces possessed by Toyota possessed the implementation of this project. So, in fairness, it should be stated that so far this flagship is not involved, it is too early to talk about the success or failure of the entire enterprise. But on the other hand, exactly the same meaning, if not more, for the global recognition of the Lexus brand, has the appearance of a car of an elite class with mixed thrust, that is, a hybrid. In fact, it’s not tempting to make an expensive machine using hybrid elements in it, such a machine that Western prestigious brands still can’t boast of. I believe that in conditions when the Lexus brand began to lose its popularity, this kind of action, for sure, will help win the lost positions.
 
The first Lexus car appeared on the Japanese market no further than last summer. This first -born was decided to make Lexus GS. Then came the line of the Lexus is. Due to the active expansion of the Lexus brand in the domestic Japanese market, the state of affairs in the segment of the elite class cars began to change. In particular, in almost one evening, 30 percent of sales of such cars have become on the Lexus brand! True, evil languages \u200b\u200bclaim that this is not sacred given the potential of Toyota. So it is, but at the same time it should be borne in mind that the total number of Lexus cars sold over the past year in the domestic market of Japan was far from what was expected. Judge for yourself: it was planned to implement 20 thousand pieces, but in fact it turned out that a little more than 10 thousand were sold. Of course, Toyota itself did not have any special illusions and understood how difficult it would be to work in the segment of elite machines. But it is one thing to imagine and plan, and it’s quite another to take the first steps and encounter a real rather than virtual reality! Now the company representatives openly declare that it was necessary to take more real plans. They say that this turned out to be a serious lesson for them. But the main thing is that it became clear that without connecting to the competition of two model rows of the Lexus family, LS and Hybrid, you can’t do.
And then a car with a mixed type of traction appeared on the market - Lexus GS450H. Whether with its help it will be possible to increase the popularity of Lexus brand in general, or not, that’s the question!
The dynamics of overclocking like a car of a 4.5-liter class, and fuel consumption is like a skewer.
The distribution of machines of the new GS450H model range by categories is simple. If in a nutshell, then the basic modification costs 6 million 800 thousand yen. But if you include leather chairs, a system for preventing clashes together with the control monitor, side airbags for passengers sitting in the rear seat, and the car retention system at a given course, such a machine will cost 7 million 700 thousand. But what is included in the basic configuration? There is also a lot of interesting things, for example, a device that is called the active stabilizer of the transverse stability, which was previously used in the Lexus GS430 car (6 million 300 thousand yen). True, there he was previlated only for an additional fee in the option of the option. In addition, the standard set includes the NAVI AVS AVS system of the latest development, so the standard category machine is also not poorly equipped. By the way, you can refuse an active stabilizer that was discussed above, and then the GS 450h basic category will cost the buyer almost the same amount as the Lexus GS430 car.
At the same time, when developing a hybrid version of Lexus, it was decided to abandon the 8-cylinder engine in favor of its 6-cylinder counterpart. This should reduce the expenses of the owner for fuel. Given the fact that the engine still has excellent speed characteristics, and you can now use the car itself at least every day, the realization price of the machine has begun to look quite attractive.
Just as it is observed in the Toyota Harrier / Harrier Hybrid pair, outwardly the GS430 and GS450H cars are not much different from each other. In particular, for the hybrid, its original body coloring (Premium Light Blue) was chosen, then the machine is equipped with 18-inch wheels with special design discs. Well, of course, the hybrid has its own emblem so that others can somehow understand where the car with a mixed type of traction is, and where not. The fact that the designers decided to give the hybrid almost the same shape as the machine with an ordinary internal combustion engine may indicate that an attempt to combine these two types of machines is made so that the Lexus \u003d Hybrid formula is entered into consciousness. It is interesting to note that this is a completely different position than the one that designers who worked and work on the appearance of another Toyota Prius hybrid. There, as everyone must be remembered, everything has an individual, not similar look.
If I already remembered the Toyota Prius car, I will allow myself to note another detail. The fact is that the goals that determine the use of mixed traction are significantly different in the first and in the second case. If in Toyota Prius the main task is the maximum fuel savings, then in the case of the GS450H hybrid, everything is different. In this project, engineers were required without reducing the power of the power plant itself, to ensure that as little fuel as possible was spent on a unit of power. In fact, the internal combustion engine itself develops a power of 296 hp, and in combination with an additional electric motor this indicator is brought to 345 hp. Here you have a hybrid! In mixed mode, fuel consumption is one liter for as many as 14.2 km. That is, this indicator is designed at the level of a regular 2-liter-class machine. Moreover, the representative of Toyota claimed that during measurement there were no attempts to create, as they say, laboratory conditions. Like, as it turned out, it happened! With normal operation, such a result, of course, is unattainable. But, nevertheless, I decided to trace how the flow rate, fuel would change, and began to carefully look at the flowmeter placed on the dashboard. So I went to the overall strip of high -speed highway. The device indicates that instant fuel consumption is equivalent to one liter per 10 km of run. Or, on a steep rise on the mountain track, a completely recessed accelerator pedal brings the consumption to one liter by 5-6 km. But on the other hand, on a flat track, the car really amazes with its efficiency. While charging the battery is enough, the electric motor is actively involved in the movement, so the flow meter often shows that the flow rate is even less than a liter per 10 km. In other words, if you control the machine in a regular manner, then the device constantly shows about 10 km/liter. Please note that the total developed maximum power of the machine is 345 hp! Where else can you find a car from the category of elites, which would have such explovation data! Just incredible economy!
A sense of unprecedented acceleration
The first impression of acquaintance with the new Lexus model was amazing. I took the driver's seat and pressed the starter button. But the engine refused to start. Then, as I was taught, I pressed the accelerator pedal, and suddenly the car started off, and this happened completely without sound only due to the electric motor. The fact is that the internal combustion engine and the electric motor are interconnected by intermediate gear transmission, which allows you to combine different types of traction. This is one of the distinctive features of the hybrid system developed by the engineers of Toyota, which gives an absolutely amazing emotional effect that is impossible to drive a Honda Civic hybrid. In fact, the movement only at the expense of electric traction can be found in other hybrid machines produced by Toyota, but in this car this feeling arises when you are inside the voluminous salon, when you are surrounded by exquisite interior details. To imagine only: an evening city, a lit street and a silent car of a chic appearance silently rushing along it. Pleasure - not convey in words!
Then I found out, however, that the movement begins with an electric motor not always. The fact is that the car switches to a purely electric traction only when the internal combustion engine has a temperature not lower than a certain (working) value. Thus, if the launch is made on a cold machine, then the main engine is launched. As for my incident, he did not start that he had not yet managed to cool after my predecessor of the tester. In other words, if the car stood in the garage, and in the morning the driver presses the start button, then the engine will work out.
The car runs very briskly. This is understandable: the power of the internal combustion engine alone is quite enough to provide the machine with normal thrust (after all, 3.5 liters of working volume!). And then an electric motor is connected! You can imagine how powerful the work of this tandem turns out. When I quite decently squeezed the accelerator pedal, I felt such an intense acceleration that I had never met in hybrids in cars. The technical passport indicates that the time of acceleration to a speed of 100 km/h is only 5.6 seconds, and this, judging by feeling, is not an exaggeration. Interestingly, the craving of the machine is perceived in a special way. This does not look like an engine with a simple inlet and large cubature, or on the turbo engine. It is even difficult to convey in words, but if you try to draw an analogy, then the feeling is as if you are sitting in an accelerating high -speed railway carriage or, perhaps, even in the cabin of a jet aircraft, when it goes on take -off.
It is a pity, however, that sometimes acceleration is perceived as if you are driving a machine with a stray transmission. What I mean? The fact is that when acceleration, sometimes it is impossible to feel the direct dependence between the speed of rotation of the crankshaft and the intensity of acceleration, just like the machine equipped with the CVT system. On the Lexus GS450H dashboard, the tachometer is not provided, and therefore there is no other way to determine the speed of rotation, as soon as by the sound of a working motor, which, albeit in a truncated form, but still penetrates the salon. So, this penetrating sound, it would seem, must change the height of the sound when the speed begins to increase sharply. But in fact, this does not always happen, and then the driver is lost in the feeling of direct engine control, especially in those moments when the engine already works at speeds close to the maximum magnitude. Yes, and if the timbre of sound becomes higher, all the same, this is not that sound does not get energy, enthusiasm. Here, it seems to me, you should either make the sound even louder, or make it completely inaudible. Companing the engine operation for the driver will remain an empty sound that is unable to cheer him up. Although for drivers preaching a calm driving manner, the car is already quite silent. In particular, this noiselessness manifests itself in those moments when, moving at an average speed, you slightly press the accelerator pedal to give the machine the desired acceleration. The speed increases, and this happens very smoothly, but the nature of the sound does not change at all. This, I must say, makes an impression. The car seems to make it clear that although its speed is quite high, but if it is necessary (within the rational one), then it can give out not that.
On the Lexus GS450H car, for the first time among Toyota hybrids, an automatic gearbox is used, which has a manual switching mode according to a 6-speed scheme. However, the transmission of a hybrid machine is also not entirely ordinary, it is not a hydromechanical automatic, and not a belt, unacceptable transmission system. In this regard, when the driver includes a manual transmission control mode, this means that control is carried out through a generator, which forces the engine to change the momentum on a compulsory basis. In other words, this system can be considered as a kind of imitation of manual switching. And in fact, you just have to try to switch in manual mode at increased speed, as anyone will immediately notice: the transmission practices this command a little longer than a hydroutomatic box or a bloodless variator. And if so, then the use of manual switching does not give the desired emotional effect from an independent selection of transmission. That is, instead of driving in an active manner, the driver receives something opposite. When I asked how to understand this, with an engineer who participated in the development of the machine, he explained this so. According to his explanations, in this particular car, the manual switching function was provided not to control the machine in an active manner, but in order to more actively use the inhibitory properties of the engine. After all, the speed control only with the help of the foot brake ultimately leads to the overspending of the fuel, and if you actively use regenerative braking, then the fuel will be less burned.

Premium discharger of the new time
The suspension of the new Lexus car also made a good impression on me. After the debut of the Machine of the GS lineup took place, I had a chance to perform a test trip by a machine equipped with a gasoline engine. The level of her comfort, I must say, did not satisfy me at all. But this happened about six months ago, and, as it turned out, this time was spent not in vain. At least from the negativity that covered me during the previous race, there was no trace left. The biggest difference between the current suspension option and the previous one became noticeable on the area of \u200b\u200bthe road with an uneven coating. Here the difference in the level of comfort immediately made itself felt. In the old car, a very tangible, sharp shocks were handed over to the driver on this site. As for the behavior of the new GS450H car, the blows in the cabin were felt, but they seemed much more muffled. This improvement in the suspension can be explained by an increase by as many as 200 kg of machine weight, which in turn is due to the presence of a large -sized battery and other components of the mixed traction system. Last time, remembering, I thought that I could not understand why it was necessary to combine an active stabilizer of stability with low -profile tires. This time, when preparing a machine for production, more attention was paid to improving its sports form, and therefore my opinion was directly opposite to the right thing that they did just that! But, let's say, the buyer decides to refuse to install an active stabilizer of the anti -cross stability, then what? Then the car will be, by itself, it is transferred to ordinary tires, and this, of course, will not add to sports, even vice versa. But the ability to remain an ordinary high -class sedan will still remain with her. Moreover, the steering amplifier, which, as you know, has an electric drive, will work differently, and the steering wheel will act more naturally.
However, one more feature of the GS450H hybrid should be noted. Heavy batteries, without which you can not do, are located behind the rear seat, and they occupy a somewhat elevated position. This, as it seemed to me, to some extent violates stability, and, therefore, should be taken into account by those who are going to control the machine in sports. But this practically does not affect the overall assessment of the machine. In any case, this drawback, I think, is one of the tasks whose solution will allow you to raise the GS450H car to a higher level.
So what in the end? The traction characteristics of the new Lexus GS450H car exceed the similar indicators of a car with a purely gasoline engine having 8 cylinders located V-shaped. At the same time, the machine has become much more economical, and the harm done by the environment has become less. Due to the fact that now in the lineup there is a new type of car, the struggle of the Lexus brand for the buyer in the car in the category of elite car entered the new phase. Ahead of us is waiting for the appearance on the market of another Lexus trump card - LS models. Well, wait and see how much she will impress buyers. As for the GS450H model, she, in my opinion, made a serious application to affirm herself as a model of a new time elite car. And Toyota again managed to demonstrate its high technical potential to the public.
Technical characteristics of the Lexus GS450H machine:
Length 4830 mm x width 1820 mm x height 1425 mm.
Wheel base: 2850 mm.
Machine weight: 1890 kg.
Drive: on the rear wheels
Internal combustion engine: 3.5-liter, 6-cylinder with a V-shaped cylinder location, developed power of 296 hp. at 6400 rpm, the largest torque is 37.5 kg/m at 4800 rpm.
Electric motor: direct current, synchronous, power of 200 hp, torque 28.0 kg/m.
Car price: 6 million 800 thousand yen.
 
 
 

A source: CarView.co.jp