Lexus LS600h hybrid: Don't mention the fuel economy...

Newswheel staff :: 13 April 2006 :: Filed under Hybrid, Saloon, Lexus, Lexus LS, Europe & UK, US

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Hybrid hyper car debuts at NYC show

It’s due out around spring 2007. It’s the world’s first petrol-electic hybrid vehicle with a V8 powerplant. It cranks out a combined peak power output of over 430bhp. And Toyota claims it’s nothing less than the most technically advanced car in the world. We give you the new Lexus LS600h luxury saloon. But here’s the catch: Lexus has so far declined to divulge precise fuel consumption figures. Suspicious? Perhaps, given the fact that the suits from Toyota will only hint at a number around the 25mpg mark…

Of course, fuel consumption figures aren’t the whole story. Toyota reckons the LS600h spews forth just 20 per cent of the smog-forming emissions of a conventional five-litre V8. The Japanese giant also claims that NVH levels (that’s noise, vibration and harshness, for the uninitiated) are around half of those found in conventional cars. So, the LS600h might just be the quietest car on the road.

LED headlamps. A first on a production vehicle, don’t ya know…

What’s more this hyper hybrid is absolutely bursting with cutting edge technology. Full disclosure of the LS600h’s ridiculous litany of tech specs would require an article of encyclopaedic proportions. Permit us, therefore, to present the following précis: four-wheel drive, a dual-stage electronically controlled and continuously variable tranny, a 19-speaker sound system, the first implementation of LED headlights in any production vehicle and the ability to parallel park itself. Oh, and it’s a bit longer than a boggo LS430, too – Lexus has bumped the wheelbase by 122mm.

Whether it’s all worth the effort compared with the ruthlessly efficient big diesels fitted to the likes of MB’s bad boy new S-Class or the BMW 7 Series, however, is hardly clear. And that’s not even factoring in the diesel-electric hybrid technology Mercedes is also working on…

Detailed performance, pricing and availability info has not been released.