We like the new Lexus GX around these parts, like, a lot. It is an all-around great truck with tons of luxury and off-roady engineering. It seems, however, that some of the engineering was perhaps half-assed. Some Lexus GX owners are reporting that their brand new luxury SUVs are melting in the sun like ice cream on a summer day. Sometimes end consumers figure out issues that engineers can’t simply because they use their vehicles in a million unpredictable ways.
Whom at Lexus could have predicted that people would park their trucks in sunny parking lots all day while they’re at work? Obviously these are edge cases, but overlooked ones all the same.
Check out this report from The Drive, complete with photos from a Lexus GX Owners’ Group on Facebook.
In what might be the strangest twist so far in the ongoing Toyota quality saga, some GX owners are watching their daily drivers’ mirror caps shrivel, wrinkle, and warp. It doesn’t stop there either as the black plastic door trim on at least one vehicle’s B-pillar is wavier than a Florida beach Jeep meet. The owners I spoke with said that they haven’t done anything out of the ordinary, claiming that they park their GX in the same spots they’ve always parked their vehicles with no previous problems to speak of. Still, the photos show something is up.
Mmmm, melty. The drivers posting these photos have confirmed that they never parked their trucks near a heat source, and have taken their vehicles back to the dealer to confirm there wasn’t a defect inside the mirror that could have caused the overheating issue. And it isn’t just the mirrors, either. From the photos it looks like the whole damn car is returning to ooze. Window trim, roof rack trim, and even some painted parts are sagging under the weight of their own plastic.
One of the GX owners who talked to The Drive said his truck’s B-pillar was “so hot it would give you a burn” on a 54-degree day. It appears that the trim on these Lexus trucks are so glossy black that they are simply absorbing every ray of sun withing a mile radius and concentrating it with an aim toward self-dissolution.
So far this seems to be a relatively limited destruction case, though it will be interesting to see what, if anything, Lexus does about the damage. There are so many variables that could be causing the issue. Some of the damaged vehicles have been wrapped in paint protection film, for example. Perhaps there’s some glass in the vicinity causing a magnification effect of the sun’s rays. It’s definitely an automotive mystery, but I know if it were my $80,000 luxury SUV, I wouldn’t be happy about it.
