2018 Lexus LS500 F-Sport – An Athletic Twin Turbo Executive Sedan? REVIEW
Channel: Premium Cars
Date: 04/01/2018

It’s one thing to design and engineer a luxury car. It’s another to make it go around a corner without making the outside front tire squeal like a 15-year-old in the front row at a Hanson concert (in 1999).

That’s a tall order for a steel-chassis sedan that weighs between 4,707 pounds for a RWD LS 500 with coil springs and 5,225 pounds for an AWD LS 500h hybrid with air bag suspension and Executive Package. How did Lexus do it? Technology. And acronyms. But the most important thing in wrestling a two and a half ton LS 500 around a corner is probably the electronically controlled anti-roll bar. More on that in a minute.

The 2018 Lexus LS rides on an almost-all-new platform, the Global Architecture-Luxury or GA-L platform. This was first used in the sporty LC 500 coupe, which we have driven and mostly liked. The LS 500 is a stretched version of the LC 500’s GA-L chassis, with a 123-inch wheelbase. Because they spent so much time developing the LC 500, engineers say they were able to make the new LS that much better by applying everything they’d learned on LC to LS. 

The LS 500 interior has everything you want in a luxury sedan.

We told you about the basics of the LS last week. But here’s a brief recap: It comes with only a V6 -- no V8, but the V6 is better than the V8 by almost every metric. The 3.5-liter longitudinally mounted twin-turbo DOHC V6 makes more power and torque across a wider band than the previous V8, all while spewing fewer emissions. The gasoline, non-hybrid V6 makes 416 hp and 442-lb-ft of torque, while the hybrid cranks out 354 combined hp. The biggest difference with the non-hybrid vs. the old V8 is the torque from 1,800 to 4,000 rpm, which is prodigious. Zero to 60 comes up in 4.6 seconds in the RWD LS 500 and 5.1 seconds in the hybrid.

The transmission is a 10-speed automatic in the non-hybrid V6 and a hybrid transmission in the hybrid, the latter featuring four regular automatic gears and six “synthetic” gears helped along by electric motors to create the sensation of a 10-speed. Life is weird sometimes.

The LS comes in rear- or all-wheel drive.

Lexus controls all that mass and all that torque using a tried-and-true method: acronyms. The acronyms all delineate various electronic systems. The main means of harnessing 5,000 pounds of kinetic Lexus when it’s time to go somewhere other than a straight line is VDIM, vehicle dynamics integrated management. This takes over everything it can get its electronic hands on: ABS, TRAC/TRC (traction control), VSC (vehicle stability control), EPS (electric power steering), VGRS (variable gear ratio steering) and DRS (dynamic rear steering). If you get the airbag suspension instead of coil springs, it also controls a new, more advanced adaptive variable suspension or AVS. (There are a few hundred thousand more acronyms covering safety systems, but we only have so much space here.)

When we got behind the wheel and threw the LS into a bunch of corners, the biggest standout among all the electronics was the electric roll bar. Or at least it felt that way. There were other systems at play.

“The new VDIM system implements cooperative control of all vehicle subsytems -- braking, steering, powertrain and suspension -- to control basic longitudinal, lateral and vertical motions as well as yaw, roll and pitch,” Lexus explained.

You can get rear seats as comfy as your own private Idaho.

The idea is to offer ride, handling and tonnage control in the same car. How does it feel from behind the wheel?

If you’re going in a straight line, the new LS is everything you want in a giant Lexus: It is quiet, commodious and comfortable. You can get seat massagers to knead your aching back, for instance. You can even order a special suite of rear seat comforts for the *cough* Chinese market *cough* where they like to ride in the back. In a straight line, you will be perfectly happy in any model of the new LS.

Our first drive was in an LS 500h, the hybrid. This combines a 295-hp 3.5-liter gasoline V6 with two electric motors for a total system power rating of 354 hp. Lexus promises 25 mpg city, 33 mpg highway and 28 combined for the RWD 500h, slightly less with AWD. But on the highway, driving it like a Lexus LS driver would, it felt perfectly luxurious: quiet, comfy and climate-controlled. We might have expected better mileage but then who are we kidding, it weighs two and a half tons!

Next we got into the surprise Easter egg of LS 500 launches, the F Sport model. Yes, it will have an F Sport available at launch. This is a bold move for a vehicle that, as we seem to keep saying, weighs two and a half tons. The output of the twin-turbo V6 in the F Sport is the same as the non-F Sport LS 500, at 416 hp and 442 lb ft of torque. In a straight line, that’s enough to launch from 0-60 in 4.6 seconds. 

The F Sport makes life worth living for LS owners.