Toyota has halted sales of the Lexus GX 460 SUV in the US on the back of a Consumer Reports claim that the electronic stability control system fails to reign-in lift-off oversteer until it may be too late for a 'save'.
A Lexus GX - 460 the right way up
Apparently the V8 powered GX (a very close relation of the 3.0 diesel-powered Land Cruiser sold over here) surprised Consumer Reports testers by swinging it's back end around too far before the ESC helped out.
"When pushed to its limits on our track's handling course, the rear of the GX we bought slid out until the vehicle was almost sideways before the electronic stability control system was able to regain control," they say.
"We perform this evaluation on every vehicle we test, which includes the 95 SUVs in our current auto Ratings. No other SUV in recent years slid out as far as the GX 460, including the Toyota 4Runner, which shares the same platform as the GX.
"To confirm our results, we paid for the use of another GX 460 from Lexus and experienced the same problem."
While certain PHers (and similarly-heroic/hairy-chested types) might just appreciate such a handling foible, the US testers issued a 'don't buy it' warning, which has naturally set the cat amongst the pigeons across the pond.
Toyota has suspended sales of the model there temporarily while its engineers investigate the issue, but has stated that the vehicle does meet all relevant regulations. Toyota GB tells us they are aware of the reports which relate only to a US-specific model, so at this stage they are not taking any action.
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