jonbays

At the end of the day raising one's voice is do-able, but in reality, shouldn't the vehicles inbuilt microphone sensitivity be factory set to work perfectly at normal voice, just as you would if you were speaking to someone in the passenger seat?

It is adjustable there are settings which can be changed.

I will look them up and let you know how. The dealer can do this for you too of course.

There is no Sports mode. There is only a sequential shift mode!

All Aurions have a six speed automatic with AI and a manual sequential shift for manually holding it in a chosen gear. Thats about the truth of it.

The sales speel on the sequential shift is SO WRONG they could be sued for false advertising it's true though.

"In sequential shift mode you can shift gears like a manual transmission, for sharper response"

I've posted something like this way back and honestly I haven't touched mine ever again, scared it will screw it up. I think it was Daryl (pardon me if it was someone else) who said in my post that it comes out of the factory like that for road standards so I've gotten use to mine now.

Yep, that was me that you were recalling. It was in the thread 'Headlight'.

In my opinion, I would only adjust my headlights if it definitely is out of whack. Being a little out is okay by me so long as it isn't glaring other road users. The headlights are aimed by a machine in factory and sometimes it is hard to replicate this with your own adjustments. As well, one of the adjustment screws (which is the critical up and down adjustment) is a tough one to access unless you have the appropriate tools:

I'm not sure if the Presara HID assembly has the same adjustment screws though.

Thanks I guess that is the one I missed whch does look a little awkward to do myself.

I might try on the weekend and see what happens.

Anyone know how to adjust the base alignment of the low beam self levelling and steering headligts on the Presara?

There are adjusters on the back of the headligh assembly but these don't seem to do diddly squat.

I have a Presara and for the money it's certainly a more sophisticated luxo barge than the Holden Calais or Fairmont ghia and close enough to the Lexus, Honda and Subaru. it really does everything pretty well but is a trifle bland perhaps.

The big let downs for me are the foot parking brake and the lack of fold down rear seats.

The traction control on off button would be nice but in all reality for the number of times i needed to disable it the service routine was good enough and once you have driven with it off in the wet you realise why only rwd cars have the disable switch.

Torque steer never bothered me though it is there as you would expect in a 200kw FWD of course.

The transmission manual mode is a bit of a con as it has been correctly stated earlier that it is a manual overide only and impossible to drive as a manual. I have gotton over that slight disappointment.

The ipod port well i'm too old to worry about that and it stops the kids annoying me with thier music so that's just fine with me.

The bluetooth proximity key and start button I have gotten used to now and like very much.

These dealer extras are all a con to get more margin out of the sale. Do not buy them. it's a well worn trick after the contract is signed walk the punter round to service dept and take more money for rust protection paint protection anything at all it doesnt matter to make a dollar.

Has anyone else noticed this ? I didn't see it until 20k later.

Yes I have. Hasn't bothered me enough to do anything about it yet though.

I can't believe how many people carry on about CAI and the performance gains they get from it still.

This is all marketing hype from the air filter and after market accessory people who want to rip you off.

None of this will make any measurable performance difference on an Aurion or any other modern well designed engine at all.

If you like the better under bonnet look and the extra noise then it works for you great but please dont tell me you can feel the extra power. To feel the extra power you would need to do something more dramatic to actually effect the efficiency of the pumping of the engine. I have changed cams in cars and swore it felt faster as the on cam rush felt good but on the dyno and at the dragstrip I was proved wrong. Just moving the power curve around. I can guarantee you CAI is going to do diddly squat for the performance of an Aurion.

Nice to see the chart but it doesn't really make a lot of sense to me the AFR's are way too rich till 134 kmh when the throttle must have been backed off with it still being run up to 143 kmh. This is a bit odd? Why would you do that on a power run?

This is third gear which in an Aurion depending on wheels and tyres is around 24kmh per 1,000 rpm. So you would expect to see a power run from 5,000 rpm to 6250 rpm or 120 to 150kmh. The peak power here is shown at 134 kmh or about 5500rpm which is well short of what I would expect of 150 kmh and 6250 rpm.

Also I would wonder why the intake temp is 5 degrees colder than the atmospheric temp?

quote]

Correct me if I am wrong... but I thought the TRD Aurion has a claimed power of 241kw at the fly wheel?

Anyway, not a bad result man! One tough car I must say, and soooo quick!

Let's see the graph!

Yes you're right and that does makes more sense too 241 at the fly 184 at the wheels 24% transmission loss.

184kw at the wheels is a good result for a car wth a 200kw claimed output at the flywheel. I hvae done a lot of dyno tuning and you usually expect to lose around 20% in driveline losses.

I have seen plenty of the old 5L Holden and Ford V8's do less than this too by the way.

The operator doesn't sound to well trained though. Turning off traction control is a must though to be fair it's a bit awkward in an Aurion compared to most other cars. For a maximum power run at a dyno day you would usually run it in the 1:1 gear (4th) and ease it up to 160 or around 4500rpm then floor it to avoid kickdown. You should watch the correction factors too as with inexperienced operators they can stuff this up. If you see numbers like AT 25 and IT 45 etc then it's buggered even if it is in shootout mode.

The only way you could get a full rev range graph of maximum output in a modern auto is in first and then it would climb off the rollers or wheelspin anyway. In the good old days we used to just pull off the kickdown cable or pull the plug off the back of the kickdown switch.

Worked with my Nokia N73. For some reason though only when the engine was running? I have hindreds of contacts and they all synched up easy as not one by one select all transfer gone and done in 2 minutes. It's almost confusing to have so many synched to the car though.

I am very sure proper CAI will gain some performance. Done that, enjoying it! and now still waiting for exhaust done then dyno.

I really doubt that any CAI will do anything but give you a faster under bonnet look.

This is mostly a huge con. There is no science to why it should do anything this side of the butterfly.

Exhaust tuning will work but how much gain is the question. Better sound sure. More kw on the dyno well not much but a before and after test back to back would impress me. ECU tuning to make the exhaust mods work well that may add a bit but again who is doing it and how much.

The basic facts are a 200kw 3.5L engine is not going to have all that much upside without some more major mods and CAI and exhaust aren't going to make big differences.

Gone are the days when you could get your stock falcon/holden/valaint 100kw odd 3 Plus litre six to increase in power by 20% just by sticking on extractors and a decent exhaust.

I have looked into tuning the Aurion a bit and I have done a fair bit of engine tuning in the past on all sorts of engines from VW flat fours, Ford fours, Holden, falcon and Valiant Hemi 6's and I can't see it as worthwhile.

There are very few things in the Aurion that could be further improved for performance without major compromises. There is a little bit of power and I mean less than 10 rear wheel kw maximum, that could be gained from the exhaust if you don't care or worry about noise and emission control. There is no gain from any intake system cold air or ram air that would make any measurable differnce at road speeds. The basics cylinder head design compression ignition and valve timing leave very little improvement to be made. The ECU progrqam is typically programmed to be on the safe side but all the fuel economy improvement testing Toyota ran mean it actually runs very close to the ideal for performance too. If you had a manual six speed close ratio gearbox and could keep the engine in thee 4500-6500 rev range then some gains could be made with cam timing changes but it would be strictly race use then only and worse for every day street use.

The only thing I see as useful to add performace would be a bigger engine, direct injection from the lexus and AWD transmission system but supercharging is the easiest way to achieve a bigger engine and TRD have proven that through even though they couldn't get big gains either although a true 40kw gain on a 200kw engine is really very good it doesn't sound as impressive as some of the falcon turbo six claims you here of.

Overall the Aurion is a family car one with a decent engine and turn of speed that would beat any performance car of the 70's or 80's but today it can't hope to cut it against AWD turbo sixes and fours that can use the power they have in every day sitiations safely.

OK OK you don't need glasses.

I see it IS possible to build a 3.5L V6 using some Toyota V6 Bottom end components that can make 600kw at the flywheel at 18lbs boost.

Not that you can do anything with that engine in an Aurion but yes you can build a 3.5L V6 to do 600kw it on an engine dyno.

Even those pretty serious power nutters cut the boost to run the engine in the buggy with any expectation of finishing a race.

I just don't see a road going twin turbo intercooled version of that engine making it into any Aurion or Camry somehow.

Petrol is probably the most obvious expense of running a car but the reality is it's a pretty small part of the cost of NEW car ownership.

If you can afford a new car and I mean truly afford it not just afford the repayments petrol cost isn't a big thing.

Depreciation and interest cost will be the big expenses with a new car. With a second hand car it's different as usually it will be more running and repairs and maitenance costs.

Fuel wise the differnce between an Aurion and any small econmoy car is small unless you do a lot of km a year.

For example say the Aurion does get 10L/100km on average and a Pruis gets say 5L/100km which is then at $1.50 a litre for petrol and 10,000km a year the Prius costs $750 a year on fuel and the Aurion $1,500 $750 a year more or about $62 amonth or $15 a week more.

At 20,000 km a year it's just double again. $1,500 more etc.

So the petrol cost difference betweenan Aurion and anything else really will be less than $125 a month on petrol. If you only just making the repayments its worth considering.

Also worth remembering that your $40k new car will lose $20k in value over the first four years ownership and that's $420 a month!

more after some bolt-ons. in the way of cold air induction what you got available? any piks of this before and installed?

as for the supercharger not really that keen on it.. too much money to do it all might as well just buy a trd version work out much cheaper.

i have seen one of these engines twin turboed producing 630kw i think it was on a like dune buggy with not that great a deal of boost. but thats too much power i just want to make around 250kw at the treads. what could be bought in the way of vvti?? could you maybe get like a vtec controller installed or does the aurion vvti system work diffrently to vtec?

I agree the TRD Harrop supercharger is a better bet and should give more torque or power at lower revs with less losses as it is a better more modern design.

I think you need glasses though if you have seen a 630kw 3.5L Toyota V6, it would be battling to get 630HP even.

Never noticed it in my Presara?

Well the fuel consumption varies a bit depending on what i am doing and where. over the last few fills this is what I have been getting in L/100km 9.22, 10.86, 14.46, 9.96, 13.11, 13.54, 12.37, 9.52, 14.29.

Is it a very slight (low volume) and intermittent rattle ? Is it apparent when the inner cover is open and not when closed? At least that is one rattle I've discovered over last few days, but it's so slight that if radio is on it can't be heard, and it's only present over bumps when the inner cover is fully open. I'm driving around touching/holding various parts at the moment to isolate the culprit for my next service complaint...

I have a passenger side dash squeak (also intermittent) which is a lot more annoying. I would happily keep the moonroof one over the dash one... problem is that I can't replicate it on demand, so no doubt when I take it in for service I won't be able to demonstrate the problem. :( (Murphy's law)

I have a Presara with the same very slight rattle too only when the cover is open can you hear it too.

I went for black exterior, black leather. Looks great, but geez it gets hot in the sun...

I liked the look of the silver with black inteior as you see the Presara in all the brochures but having had black leather interior in my ford before i didn't want to get black again. If you wear shorts cause it's hot and park in the sun you do regret it even if it does look good.

The titan silver is really just beige but its as close as you can get to the gold which is the colour I wanted too but no not available in Presara. The silver presaras look better with black interior to me. I have seen the white and light blue with sandstone trim and they looked OK too.

14.8 @95mph Thats too bloody good.

I want to run mine at WSID now for sure.

never would have thought they would run this well out of the box.

Greetings All,

This is my my first post on this forum.

I live in the remote far west of NSW so it's a long drive to get anywhere.

I have owned Toyotas for the last 23 yrs. A 60 series GXL Cruiser, 80 series GXL TD Cruiser and a 2002 Avalon Sorrento. I have never had a problem with any of them.

Currently my 80 series has 260.000 klm on it, still going strong however I am trading the Avalon in on a Presara, delivery date is in May 08.

My query relatates to the Sandstone Reflex Leather which I have ordered.

I have been right through the Toyota website and they show a 360 degree interior view of a Black interior. The also show small colour patches of the available interior colour schemes, but that doesnt really give much of an idea of what Sandstone really loks like.

I was wondering if anyone with the Sandtone interior would mind posting an image of it.

Thanks in advance

Quark

Mmmmmm.....thanks for the reply guys. Does sound a bit risky.

I really wish Toyota Australia wasn't so gready by charging an arm and a leg for their unit. Not really sure what I'm going to do?

These aftermarket ones might be the next best thing, what do you guys reckon?

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi...rksid=p3907.m29

http://members.optusnet.com.au/auspacks/productPage9.html - This unit costs $899.

Do yourself a favour and go buy a Garmin Nuvi or simmilar quallity!!..At least they wont charge for upgrades, wont cost an arm and a leg, detail is heaps better and more user friendly!!..My two bobs worth:)..

One more thing:), can use it from one car to another being portable..

Portable sounds good unless you live in Sydney and that translates to stealable. it becomes a pain taking them witrh you everywhere you park the car that might eb a bit ddodgy.