One mighty fine car
A motoring experience like few others
The 500’s 10-speed Aisin was phenomenally well calibrated for use at the Circuito Monteblanco, all rapid-fire downshifts and delayed upshifts that let the high-revving double overhead cam V8 sing. But on the road — even those twisty routes with the bit between your teeth — it can be too aggressive, the double-tap on every downshift too abrupt for what is, after all, a gran turismo. The 500h’s transmission is the opposite; confused on the track, the h’s combination of planetary gears and four-speed “overdrive” was perfect for a twisty road in D-for-Drive mode. The shifts were crisp without being overwrought and it kept the revs in the meat of the Hybrid Synergy Drive’s powerband. The perfect LC would be a mating of the 500’s motor and the h’s gear selection.
There’s little negative to be said about the LC 500’s chassis. An amalgam of ordinary steel, high-strength steel, aluminum and carbon fibre, the LC’s framework may well weigh too much — 1,935 kilograms for the 500 and 1,985 kg for the h — but it is stiff as all get out. Combined with a new independent suspension system, said to be 24 per cent stiffer in camber, the LC handles a treat, even hooning about on a wet, twisty Spanish racetrack. Here the 500, with its high-revving 471 hp, excels. The LC 500 may not be a 911 GT3, but neither is it the tottering Lexuses of yore.
And there’s good news for the environmentally conscious as well. Other than being 50 kg heavier than the 500, the hybrid’s frame, suspension damping and tire selection are all identical to the supposedly racier V8. Even the brakes are up to the task. Lexus also claims that the car can reach 140 km/h on electric power alone.
As for the interior, it may not be as gorgeous as the exterior, but it’s not too shabby at all. There’s alcantara leather on the inside of the doors, soft touch leather all over the dashboard, and the gauge set is an LFA clone, right down to the sliding tachometer ring that moves left or right depending on the drive mode. It’s very attractive.
The downside is an infotainment system — Lexus calls it Remote Touch Interface — that is extremely hard to decipher. I defy anyone to calibrate the tripmeter for the average fuel economy without the help of Bill Gates. And pairing the phone isn’t done in the “Phone” section of the interface, but somewhere deep in the “Settings” section. Silly, stupid and unnecessarily complicated.
That said, I don’t care. I would love to wake up to this car every morning. I can easily make excuses for its slightly wonky transmission and more seriously troubled infotainment system. It is, after all, beautiful. And, as Oscar Wilde once intoned, “Beauty is a form of genius. It needs no explanation. It cannot be questioned. It makes princes of those who have it.”
The LC 500 and LC 500h will be in Lexus dealerships in the spring. As for price, that’s currently anyone’s guess. Prices close to BMW’s 650j and Mercedes-Benz S550 have been quoted as “targets.” That means the base price of the 500 could be anywhere from $100,000 to $150,000. We don’t even know which model — the rorty V8 or the frugal hybrid — will be the top-of-the-line version. Stay tuned for more information.