Merc1
Premium
It is a brand new car but we all have heard or read about it like it was a classic...it? The Lexus LS and more precisely the LS600h! The big brother of the LS460 could have simply been a « better » version featuring a more powerful engine and a couple tweaks here and there but Lexus wanted more...the « h » stands for Hybrid, and this amazing automobile will soon be available in all the Lexus Centres around the globe.
It's been over a year since the first informations about this Hybrid Luxury Sedan started to emerge...the (ladies and gentlemen) first Luxury car powered by a Hybrid engine in the world! Over the months, a whole lot of technical informations have been shared over the internet and specialized magazines but this is not what we wanted to focus on for this test drive, so if you are looking for a little « update » on what this car is made of, have a look at the following......
Lexus has been communicating a lot on what make this car different, and its the amazing amount of technology brought together to create what might be the most technology advanced car to date, whether we talk about active/passive security or the amazing 5 litre engine (V8 VVT-iE) linked to an electric one good for 445BHP...or the impressive exterior dimensions: a length of 5,15 metres (for the L version, 5,03 for the standard version), a width of 1,88m and height of 1,48m...the weight is impressive as well (2,290kg or over 2,400kg) but the AWD transmission (40% front – 60% rear) is said to make the whole thing easy to manouver...While I'm at it, let me precise that only the L (for Limousine) version will be available to our North American friends while the Europeans will enjoy the standard one.
A world premiere doesn't happen everyday, even in Japan, so I decided, with the kind authorization of Lexus Japan, to spend 1 week with the LS600h and after a couple days I had my mind made up...my point of view is two sided...let's say that there are 2 ways to see and think about this car...on one hand there is what we all heard and that we take for granted; the technology, Hybrid system, security...and on the other there is all that remains to be checked and verified, the drivability, the comfort...in a couple words: how is it to drive such a gigantic machine on a daily basis?
TECHNOLOGY is the key word, it almost seems that the car was built upside down, it's not a car full of technology, it's a technology with 4 wheels and a steering! One simple example was given to us some months back at the Toyota Safety DAY, this car is real cocoon in which there is almost nothing to fear...and as the majority of the other cars you could come across on the roads is smaller, it feels a bit like driving an SUV, away from any possible danger. And the number of security systems is so high that the best thing is to simply forget about them...even though there can always be a risk, you can be sure that, whatever the case be, the LS600h won't let you down.
Full Article, More Pics and Video:
1 week with the Lexus LS600h : Nihon Car .com
M
