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LEXUS LS 460 AWD

Published 9:42 am Friday, April 17, 2009

This is giving away the first answer to the Car Quiz inside today’s Driving section, but in its 2009 Annual Auto Issue, Consumer Reports picked the Lexus LS 460 as Best Overall Vehicle.

No wonder.

LS 460 is Lexus’ flagship luxury sedan, the ultimate in what the brand is best known for: comfort, convenience, technology and workmanship.

For 2009, the LS 460 is available with all-wheel drive, and a memory function is added to the front passenger-side seat.

My tester was an LS 460 with AWD. This big, heavy sedan (198 inches long, 5,850 pounds) is propelled with remarkable alacrity by a 4.6-liter V8 engine producing 380 horsepower and 367 lb-ft of torque. It can move all that weight from 0 to 60 mph in only 5.9 seconds. (With two-wheel drive, the trip is even shorter: 5.4 seconds.) A standard eight-speed sequential automatic transmission complements the engine perfectly, and helps save fuel.

I have great love and appreciation for quick acceleration. Not only is it fun, but it’s also a driver’s best friend when merging and jockeying for position on freeways, and during passing situations brought on by those infuriating (and law-breaking) drivers who delay traffic on two-lane roads.

Funny thing about the LS 460, though. It is so astoundingly smooth and quiet, its interior so bedecked with comfort, convenience and entertainment features, all I wanted to do was get in, chill out, take in the scenery and enjoy the ride. Anyway, with a vehicle like this one, by the time a sensation of speed kicks in, you’ve already exceeded felony exhibition-of-speed levels, so why bother.

My tester was equipped with the optional Navigation/Mark Levinson Package ($5,645), which includes a 19-speaker audio system with Reference Surround Sound, DVD audio and DVD video playback, a voice-activated hard disc drive navigation system with backup camera, Bluetooth technology, XM satellite radio and NavTraffic with real-time traffic capability.

The sound system alone was enough to make anyone chill out and enjoy the ride, and the NavTraffic feature helped me avoid a two-mile backup on Highway 205 in Oregon. To be honest, I’d forgotten the car even had that feature until it suddenly alerted me to the rolling slowdown ahead.

Standard safety features include airbags and air curtains everywhere, electronic controlled braking, vehicle dynamics integrated management, traction control, anti-lock brakes, electronic brake-force distribution, brake assist, auto-leveling foglamps, and adaptive front lighting. My tester came with an optional pre-collision system and dynamic radar cruise control ($2,850).

And that’s not all. The tester’s final option: Luxury Value Edition, adding power rear seats with memory, front and rear heated and cooled seats, headlamp washers, intuitive parking assist and more ($2,895).

LS 460 also offers a segment-exclusive feature called Advanced Parking Guidance System. With this, the car can practically parallel- and back-in park on its own. The driver just positions the vehicle, selects the desired parking space via the navigation screen, and APGS uses the backup camera, sonar sensors and the electric power steering system to guide the car into the space.

In the wet and snowy seasonal climates of the Pacific Northwest, all-wheel drive adds an extra layer of safety and stability to this already safety- and stability-laden car.

There’s not much negative impact on fuel economy. AWD versions have an EPA rating of 16 mpg city, 23 highway; with 2WD the numbers are 16/24.

A long-wheelbase, executive limo-like version of the LS 460 is available, called the LS 460 L.