2005 Lexus Rx330 Base Sport Utility 4-door 3.3l on 2040-cars

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The Lexus Sriracha IS is the hottest Lexus ever

For this year's Los Angeles auto show, Lexus created its hottest IS ever: the Sriracha IS. And the company did so by putting Sriracha sauce in everything! It's in the paint, the steering wheel, and even in the trunk! Check out the video if you don't believe us. Ok, so Lexus didn't really put Sriracha in everything. In reality, the company partnered with Huy Fong Foods to produce this one-off car, and turned to West Coast Customs to execute it. It features a custom paint job designed to emulate the look of Sriracha sauce, and green accents on the grille, mirrors, brake calipers, and exhaust tips are a call back to the food company's sauce bottles. View 13 Photos Inside, West Coast Customs created some clever and surprisingly subtle changes. The climate controls only show increasing heat levels, and the seat heater buttons are bright red with little flames above the seat icons. The drive selector trades sport mode for "Sriracha" mode. The seats get red and green inserts along with logos stitched into the seat backs. Other parts of the interior have green contrast stitching, too. The steering wheel is a particularly unique piece. West Coast Customs found a liquid that looks similar to sriracha, put it a resin container and shaped it to fit the steering wheel, so now it looks like there's sriracha in the steering wheel. It also has a warning sticker for "hot handling." And lest you think there isn't any real Sriracha anywhere in the car, you'll find 43 bottles of the stuff in the trunk, and the key fob dispenses some as well. As for how Lexus tops this, perhaps they could make a habanero or ghost pepper car. Or maybe they could show us a real IS F successor. We think another V8 Lexus would come across as pretty hot. Related Video:

Are you the Lexus GS F?

It's been a while since we've heard rumors of the fabled high-performance Lexus GS F, but thanks to our eager spy photographers, this looks to be our first real proof of the machine's existence. We don't have the usual brace of photos from all angles to work with this time around, our spies saying that every time Lexus' garage door opened, engineers jumped in front of the cameras to prevent the car from being photographed.
Even so, we have a pretty clear glimpse at some significant changes to this GS sedan, including the same staggered, quad-pipe exhaust found on the Lexus IS F. There's also an air diffuser panel nestled between the exhaust outlets, as well as a larger lip spoiler and unique wheels (matching those of the RC coupe) wrapped in high-performance tires.
Last time we heard rumors of the GS F's existence, sources predicted that the M5-fighting sedan would use a tuned version of Lexus' 5.0-liter V8, producing something like 465 horsepower. We have also heard that the automaker plans to reduce weight wherever possible, and that the final curb weight will be something like 3,700 pounds.

Lexus designers create lunar transport concepts

NASA is working to put human back on the moon by 2024, the idea being to use it as a way station for the eventual colonization of Mars. Since those humans won't want to moonwalk everywhere, they'll need new transportation — the battery-electric Lunar Rover the Apollo astronauts left up there probably won't start. Designers at the European Advanced Design Studio for Toyota and Lexus created a few potential, and yes, fanciful, craft for getting around our satellite for Document Journal magazine's The Lunar Design Portfolio. The artwork joins a collection of articles by culture critics, philosophers, architects, and more about the issues confronting humanity's return to the mistress of tides. Out of the seven concepts, the Lexus creation chosen to appear in the issue is Karl Dujardin's Zero Gravity, which turns the automaker's spindle grille into a single-seater moto-like hovercraft capable of doing 310 mph. The Bouncing Moon Roller by Julien Marie attaches a wheel-like stabilizer to a gyroscope cell protected by a flexible graphene nanotube bubble meant for hopping over the terrain, whereas the Lexus Lunar Cruiser by Keisuke Matsuno serves land and sky by having wheels that can flip out 90 degrees to serve as ducted fans powering a drone capsule. Jean-Baptiste Henry's Lexus Cosmos isn't for the surface at all, with a Lexus mothership and Moon Explorator capable of solar system travel. The glass construction of the observatory in the Moon Explorator allows "group experience contemplation [of] Zero G," and there's even a "space swimming pool." The Mothership awaits a role in the next installment of A Space Odyssey, a glossy habitat for whatever life forms succeed humans. Astronauts might be able to launch from the mothership in the Lexus Lunar Mission craft designed by Yung Presciutti, using wings shaped like spindle grilles. Because all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy even in space, the Lexus Lunar is a 6x6 "massive transport vehicle designed to explore and discover the moon safely," meaning it can haul a few Moon Racers — both of which are also Presciutti's work —  a different kind of single-seater craft made to "jump, climb, race, and discover" the light and dark sides of the moon.