The story
The LX 470 is a 100 Series Land Cruiser, sharing its floor pan and most of its body panels, with Lexus fitting the expensive suspension from day one. Underneath are a ladder frame, a solid rear axle, torsion-bar independent front suspension, full-time four-wheel drive with a lockable center differential, and Toyota's 4.7-liter 2UZ-FE V8. On top of that sits Adjustable Height Control (AHC), a hydraulic system that raises the truck for trails and lowers it for loading, plus Adaptive Variable Suspension (AVS) for the dampers. The Land Cruiser didn't get AHC even as an option until 2006. Every LX 470 had it from launch.
A V8 AND A NEW FRONT END
Critics had called the LX 450 underpowered, so its replacement got a V8. The LX 470 debuted at the Los Angeles Auto Show in December 1997, and sales began in the second quarter of 1998. The 2UZ-FE made 230 hp from launch. It is a quad-cam, 32-valve engine with a timing belt, which shapes the ownership experience. The bigger change was up front. The live axle gave way to independent suspension with torsion bars, a first for the Land Cruiser line, and Wikipedia's Land Cruiser article says that change limited off-road capability and durability.
The lockers went too. The LX 450's optional electric front and rear lockers disappeared from the US LX. A rear locker stayed available in Canada for 1998 and 1999. In their place came the transfer case's locking center differential and, from 2000, A-TRAC brake-based traction control with VSC. Also in 2000, the front differential went from two pinion gears to four. One IH8MUD veteran warns that pre-2000 front diffs "can grenade with little stress."
THE HYDRAULIC TRICK
AHC replaces most of the conventional springing with hydraulics. There are actuators at each corner, gas-charged accumulators (owners call them globes or spheres), a pump and a reservoir. On IH8MUD, owners compare the settings like this: Normal sits at roughly Land Cruiser height, Low is a little over an inch lower, and High is 2–3 inches above a Land Cruiser. AVS picks from 64 damper settings in under 2.5 milliseconds at each wheel, with normal, comfort and sport modes. Both High and Low drop back to Normal above about 20 mph, one owner notes.
It works brilliantly while the fluid is fresh and the globes are charged. Lexus recommends an AHC fluid flush every 60,000 miles, according to the IH8MUD how-to thread, and owners who do it report a dramatically softer ride. When the globes go the ride turns harsh, and the usual test is to watch the reservoir level change between High and Low. Owners also take the cheap way out. They adjust the AHC height sensors for about 2 in of lift, or remove the system entirely and fit conventional springs and shocks, as at least one BaT truck has.
YEAR BY YEAR
The LX got the clever features early. The 2001 trucks got DVD navigation and a Mark Levinson option, and in 2002 Night View infrared became an option, a head-up display that projected a thermal image onto the windshield. The 2003 refresh was the big one. It brought a new front end, the A750F five-speed automatic, Variable Gear Ratio Steering, 275/60R18 tires, side curtain airbags, 235 hp and stronger driveshafts with bigger U-joints. For 2006, VVT-i raised output to 275 hp and LED taillights arrived. The last hurrah was a 2007 Limited Edition of 400 trucks in Black Onyx with stone leather.
Not everything aged gracefully. Lexus recalled about 39,000 2003–2007 trucks in 2010 because a hard pothole hit could unseat a snap ring on the steering shaft. The 2UZ also has a habit of loosening its spark plugs, which IH8MUD members have documented in detail. The early tick is often mistaken for a cracked exhaust manifold, which on these engines is also common.
HOW IT ENDED
US sales were 14,732 in calendar 2000 and slid steadily to 2,468 in 2007, when the 200 Series-based LX 570 arrived with a 383-hp 5.7-liter V8. The LX 470 had collected J.D. Power initial-quality awards (2000, 2002 and 2004) and was named the most reliable luxury SUV over three years in 2005. Its little brother, the GX 470, had arrived for 2003 with the same 2UZ-FE V8.
Two decades on, the LX 470 is a bargain for anyone who can wrench. High-mileage trucks with full records are common. IH8MUD signatures list LX 470s past 290,000 miles, and parts, armor and how-tos for the 100 Series fit the LX almost without exception. The AHC is the one thing that scares buyers off. Kept up, it's a genuine off-road advantage. If you'd rather not keep it up, the conversion is well documented.
SIDEBAR · THE TOYOTA THAT WAS A LEXUS
Land Cruiser Cygnus
In Japan, the LX 470 was sold as a Toyota: the Land Cruiser Cygnus. Wikipedia notes that the 100 Series 'formed the basis for the Lexus LX 470, also sold in Japan as the Toyota Cygnus.' DrivingLine describes the Cygnus as Japan's luxury version of the LX 470.
The Cygnus and the LX shared the gadgets. In 2002, Night View, the infrared camera system that projected a thermal image onto the windshield, arrived on both the Cygnus and the LX 470.
