Most Obscure Gen III Facts (way out there)

Wood yes, leather everywhere no, not the RX 330s I owned.

 

Very few cars with leather seats have full leather--on most it's just the seating surface.

 

I just looked at my '08 IS 350--the IS has a standard, premium, and luxury level for interior items. The top two get you real wood trim and ventilated/heated seats, and as best I can determine my ventilated (perforated) seats have leather on the sides and rear as well (much of the back of the seat is hard plastic). A small portion of the door trim above the arm rest also looks like leather. I've seen some really nice vinyl that looks and feels close to leather, but this does look like the real thing. It all depends on the package, but I don't have any problem with it being only on the seat surface if that's the option. The sides, rear, and doors don't provide any advantage while the seat surface does have a little better comfort than vinyl in cold and hot.

 

Exactly.

 

To 32kcolors & jay man2,

Are you both sure that the Lexus uses REAL wood? I'll explain why I'm asking this but
I know I'm going to speak of a completely different animal here, so don't yell at me too loudly please. Just this past Wednesday at the car auction I drive at, I was in an Infinity (Nissan's high end car---like Lexus is to Toyota & Acura is to Honda) when a piece of "wooden" trim fell off the passenger door panel. Looking at all the wood trim in the car, one would think it was real wood, but with the piece that fell off now in my hand (the glue had let go) I could tell it was only a very thin piece of PLASTIC (by the way it could be twisted without breaking or cracking). So does anyone other than Rolls-Royce & maybe Mercedes really use REAL wood in their cars any more?

As an aside, the week before, I was driving an Infinity EX35G (similar in shape to the Nissan Murano) that had a very interesting (optional?) feature. You could press a "camera" button & get a split screen display on its MFD. On the right side of the screen was a top-view diagram of the car with small live-action camera views of all 4 sides of the car. Which ever of the 4 views you selected would give you a much larger version of that view on the left side of the screen. For the rear camera lens I assume it's in a similar location as on the Prius (license plate area under hatch handle) but I didn't check. The front camera was in the middle of the inverted V portion of the oval shaped Infinity emblem on the grill & the 2 side-view cameras were in the bottoms of the outside rear-view mirrors.

Ken (in Bolton,Ct)

 

Lots of car manufacturers still use real wood--I've had BMWs and Mercedes with real wood. Porsche also offers real wood trim as an option (although I don't think it belongs in a Porsche interior). Keep in mind that it's a very thin veneer, that's glued over plastic (OK--perhaps not on a Rolls).

 

The plood (plastic wood) in my Highlander was just as nice as the bird's eye maple veneer in my RX 330, if not nicer.

 

For many years, Mercedes glued the veneer to an aluminum backing which would deform in the event of impact, and not splinter the wood. I expect all the solutions now still maintain that principle in the event of an impact.

 

Yes, Lexus does indeed use real wood in all their vehicles. We've confirmed this over at Club Lexus many times. A forum member actually saw a wrecked Lexus with wood splinters. You're talking about Infiniti, which may or may not use real wood. Acura is lowest end relative to Lexus and Infiniti so don't bet on it either.

P.S. The Lexus wood trim parts are extremely expensive, $700-900 per piece! I was extremely careful not to break the clips while removing them when installing the Vaistech ipod unit in a RX350 and a GX470.

 

Whew!
I just read this WHOLE thread trying to find the answer to the question:
What is HUD? In a earlier post someone posted about it and I had a heck of a time figuring out what it is!
Ironically, as I was on the last page of my reading marathon, a friend called and when I told him what I was doing and trying to find out he laughingly told me it stands for Heads-up-display.

:roll:

I guess I learned a lot anyway!

Obscure fact contribution: This car comes with a chat board where you can get any and all questions answered, find like minded others who lose sleep over eta dates, and a willing audience to inflict car pictures on.

 

HUD = Heads Up Display. puts certain info right on windshild so to speak...We dont have it on our models in the states. Overseas only so far .

 

Re: What is Gadgetdad talking about here?

Could someone put up a picture that demonstrates this?
I don't get what Gadgetdad is saying.
I have an IPhone so a picture of that would be helpful.
Thanks in advance.

 

Not to be too picky, but it's Head Up Display... singular (probably because most drivers only have one).

 

Hey, speak for yourself! Us five-headed space chicks deserve recognition too! :alien::alien::alien::alien::alien:

 

You call it what you want but this works for me
"
Heads-up (or head up) display screen began to be used in aircraft in the 1960s. These project images and information on to the aircraft windscreen and can be viewed by the pilot while still keeping half an eye on the flightpath ahead - so long as his head is up of course. The first citations of that are from an advert in the New York Times, 1967, for a "Heads-up display", and in this definition from the Toronto Globe & Mail, 1978:

"There are experiments with what pilots call a ‘heads-up display’ that projects vital information on to the windshield."
​

 

heh..that sounds almost Medieval ;-)