2018 Lexus LC500 / LC500h

A few years ago, I had an epiphany while attending the mega Cars and Coffee in Irvine, California, on Saturday morning—an event that grew so large it eventually had to be shut down. After perusing the literally hundreds of vehicles, everything from daily driven enthusiast fare to the latest supercars, with a car-guy friend of mine who at the time worked for Toyota, we both realized that there wasn’t a single Toyota or Lexus. This would seem to be a problem for those brands.

Toyota president Akio Toyoda wasn’t there, but he would agree with that assessment, as he’s on record stating that the long-term success for both the Toyota and Lexus brands requires going beyond smooth, quiet, and comfortable A-to-B transportation. The company as a whole needs aspirational vehicles that inspire passion and cast a shadow of excellence over the two brands. In fact, Toyoda-san has made it his personal mission to prevent the word “boring” from ever again coexisting in a sentence with “Lexus.” If the new LC, which stands for Luxury Coupe, is an indicator of things to come, we’d say he’s well on his way to succeeding.

Mere minutes into our drive of the LC500 on the sinuous and extremely well-maintained backroads of southern Spain was all it took to have this epiphany: There’s actual road texture being transmitted through the well-shaped and expertly finished steering wheel. It’s a much-desired quality that has been disappearing in the wake of electrically assisted power steering and misguided neutering billed as progress.

Get to Know This GA-L

The mission to build exciting cars could bode well for the brand’s ability to court enthusiasts going forward, and it also portends good things for the new LS sedan, which will ride on a larger version of the LC’s all-new front-engine, rear-wheel-drive architecture, dubbed GA-L. And the company promises an increased focus on dynamics across the lineup going forward, although that doesn’t necessarily mean Lexus is aiming to be the most athletic in every segment.

LC chief engineer Koji Sato is a former chassis engineer, so perhaps his high priority on steering isn’t all that surprising. And he was utterly flabbergasted when we mentioned that other automakers, such as BMW, have told us that steering feedback has been deliberately diminished because that’s what some customers want. Sato-san refers to the LC as a “back to basics” car, where much effort was expended to get the fundamentals nailed, and he and his team have mostly succeeded. The front suspension is a double-ball joint (both upper and lower) multilink design very similar to BMW’s latest, with a five-link, multilink setup at the rear. The opposed-piston brake calipers on both axles do an excellent job of hauling the LC down from high speeds. There was much effort expended to reduce weight and lower the center of gravity. Engineers also strived to cut mass at the extremities to diminish the polar moment of inertia for improved rotational response. This includes the use of aluminum for the hood, front fenders, and door skins, with the inner panels of the doors and trunk made from carbon-fiber-reinforced sheet-molding compound (that’s the random-oriented fiber stuff, not the neatly entwined weave). There’s also an optional carbon-fiber roof (with the weave). On the exterior, only the deep-draw rear fenders are rendered in steel. Underneath, the front suspension is forged aluminum and the front shock towers are cast aluminum. Still, the LC500 comes in at a rather heavy 4300 pounds, according to Lexus, with the LC500h hybrid adding an additional 150. That roughly matches the slightly larger and less sophisticated V-8–powered BMW 650i. And those pounds are also front heavy, with a claimed 54/46 percent front-to-rear weight distribution for the V-8 and 52/48 for the hybrid.

Nevertheless, the LC feels alive when pushed hard on the road. We’ve already mentioned the steering, and although its effort is on the light side at highway speeds, it imparts a natural confidence when hustling down wriggling roads. The suspension is tied down, there’s little body roll, and the LC transitions athletically. Although a variable-ratio rack and rear-wheel steering are available together as an optional bundle, we’d skip them, as the base setup felt great. Another reason against the so-called active steering is that the way the LC’s rear end breaks loose at the limit felt unnatural (although the LC isn’t a track car, nor do we think it should be, Lexus had us understeer the LC around a circuit anyway). It wasn’t that the LC was uncontrollable, but we suspect its variable-steering hardware had something to do with its lack of yaw-response communication as the rear end reaches its limits, although we didn’t get the chance to drive a car without it on track to verify that theory.

A Very Different Hybrid Approach: Mimic the Non-Hybrid

We should note that these dynamic comments and compliments apply equally to the hybrid model as well, as Lexus has taken a very different approach by engineering the LC hybrid to be as similar as possible to the conventional car. Both LCs wear the same 20- or 21-inch wheels and Michelin Pilot Super Sport or Bridgestone Potenza S001 tires—no efficiency-oriented low-rolling-resistance rubber here—and the hybrid retains the prominent tachometer and large magnesium shift paddles. And the hybrid powertrain has been substantially altered to mimic the conventional 10-speed automatic in the V-8. The hybrid powertrain starts with the basic building blocks from the GS450h: an Atkinson-cycle 3.5-liter V-6 connected to the typical Toyota/Lexus hybrid system, with two electric motor/generators and a planetary gearset acting as a pseudo CVT. The V-6 was chosen instead of the 438-hp V-8 hybrid hardware from the LS600h so that, unlike the LS, the hybridized LC would have a meaningful fuel-economy benefit.

The LC’s hybrid system, however, has been appended with a four-speed automatic transmission on the back of it. This allows for more electric assist at lower vehicle speeds and it enables the system to operate with the engine off at higher speeds of up to 87 mph. But here’s how it gets 10 speeds: The original CVT-esque part of the equation jumps between three fixed ratios, which are then combined with the first three downstream gears from the conventional automatic to create ratios one through nine. Tenth gear uses the final ratio from the automatic, and is the only time the hybrid bits operate as a CVT. Combined power output is 354 horsepower, an increase of 16 compared with the GS450h, although 9 of those come from revisions to the V-6. (For a deeper look at the hybrid system, head here.)

Aural Fixation

In addition to the steering, Lexus nailed the booming V-8 sound. Powered by the same 5.0-liter V-8 that’s in the GS F and RC F, the LC500’s is up a few horsepower to 471. With the help of a tube running between the intake manifold and the firewall plus flaps in the exhaust—but no electronically produced noise—the cabin is positively filled with nigh on perfect V-8 frequencies. It swells appropriately with engine speed but isn’t overbearingly loud. The ongoing march toward turbocharging has made achieving memorable sound more difficult, which makes the LC500’s naturally aspirated roar even more of a standout. Playing this V-8 opus is a new, rapid-fire Aisin 10-speed automatic. It’s not as quick-shifting as a dual-clutch gearbox, and we also experienced a few low-speed shift bobbles, but gear swaps are about as swift as they come for conventional automatics, and upshifts are punctuated with a satisfying pop from the exhaust. Paddle-requested downshifts, too, are exceptionally swift.

Unfortunately, sound is where the hybrid loses the plot line. Unlike the V-8, it does employ electronic enhancement, and its artificial moaning is further amplified when in Sport S+ mode. It’s also down 117 horsepower compared with the V-8. Does anyone looking to spend roughly $100,000 on a two-door fashion statement care about the LC500h’s potential 50 percent fuel-economy benefit if it means sacrificing the V-8’s sound and performance? Although due to the new transmission arrangement, Lexus claims the hybrid is only a few tenths of a second slower to 60 mph, but at higher speeds the performance gap felt considerably wider. Plus the hybrid’s pseudo 10-speed slurs its shifts and they’re not nearly as satisfying as those of the V-8’s automatic. And EV-only range, as is typical for Toyota and Lexus hybrids, is still miniscule, with the slightest prod of the throttle often causing the engine to fire up.

So where does the LC fit in? There’s not that much dimensional variety in the luxury coupe world. After all, the wheelbase in the Mercedes-Benz S-class coupe is just 4.1 inches longer than that of the two-sizes-smaller C-class coupe. At 113.0 inches, the Lexus LC’s wheelbase roughly splits those of the Benzes. However, its overall length is much closer to that of the C-class, and more than 10 inches shorter than the S, which helps to explain the LC’s paltry trunk space; at five cubic feet, it’s less than half that of the big Mercedes. And Lexus says that back-seat space is not a concern for potential customers. The design certainly isn’t as classically beautiful as that of the S-class coupe, but the aggressively creased design language that seems hopelessly overdone on the Lexus RX crossover works here, thanks in no small part to the coupe’s excellent proportions. And the interior design is adventurous, with flowing sweeps over the door panels and through the center console. Even the base seats are heavily bolstered, and the optional microsuede-trimmed upgrade versions are even more so. But we wonder if the latter might be a little too tight-fitting for luxury coupe clientele, and they have surprisingly few adjustments: no bolster or thigh-control adjustment, and only two-way lumbar. The LC is a more dynamic grand touring alternative to the S-class or 6-series coupes, but it’s not nearly as dynamically fabulous—and roughly 1000 pounds heavier—as a Porsche 911.

Lexus says it expects only 20 percent of the roughly 4800 expected U.S. sales of the LC to be the hybrid once the car reaches dealers next spring. That estimate may be high, which is good, because then the LCs you’ll see at a local cars and coffee almost certainly will pack the V-8.

Specifications >

VEHICLE TYPE: front-engine, rear-wheel-drive, 2+2-passenger, 2-door coupe

ESTIMATED BASE PRICES: $90,000–$100,000

ENGINE TYPES: DOHC 24-valve Atkinson-cycle 3.5-liter V-6, 295 hp, 257 lb-ft + permanent-magnet synchronous AC motor/generator, 60 hp (combined output, 354 hp); DOHC 32-valve Atkinson-capable 5.0-liter V-8, 471 hp, 398 lb-ft

TRANSMISSIONS: 10-speed automatic with manual shifting mode, continuously variable automatic with 4 fixed ratios and manual shifting mode

DIMENSIONS:
Wheelbase: 113.0 in
Length: 187.4 in
Width: 75.6 in Height: 53.0 in
Passenger volume: 81 cu ft
Cargo volume: 5 cu ft
Curb weight (C/D est): 4300–4450 lb

PERFORMANCE (C/D EST):
Zero to 60 mph: 4.3–4.8 sec
Zero to 100 mph: 10.2–11.2 sec
Standing ¼-mile: 12.8–13.3 sec
Top speed: 155–168 mph

FUEL ECONOMY (C/D EST):
EPA combined/city/highway driving: 22–33/19–30/28–38 mpg