The Lexus RX SUV is a quiet, understated seller in the UK and this “95% new” version looks like it’ll pick up from where the last one leaves off when it goes on sale in early 2023.
It’s based on an uprated version of Lexus’s GA-K platform, which underpins the smaller NX SUV, and it remains the same size as the outgoing RX, at 4.89m long, albeit with wider front and rear tracks and a 60mm-longer wheelbase, which increases interior space.
With more torsional rigidity because of some strengthening at the rear of the chassis, it has a new multi-link rear suspension system and, like the NX, MacPherson struts at the front. The new RX comes in three different flavours, all electrified to an extent, but all quite differently.
The most straightforward is the RX 350h, which has a 2.5-litre four-cylinder in-line engine mated to Toyota/Lexus’s trusty hybrid system, which uses two motor generators and the petrol engine mated via a planetary gearset so that the engine and one drive motor can spin at whatever speed the electronics dictate, regardless of the wheel speed. (It’s incredibly hard to explain until you see a model of it.) In this guise, the petrol engine makes 188bhp and the front electric motor 180bhp, but there’s also a 54bhp motor for the rear axle.
The hybrid uses an NiMH battery of undisclosed size. All up, the maximum power is 247bhp and its rivals are typically smallish-diesel-engined alternatives. Then there’s the meat of the new range, the RX 450h+ plug-in hybrid, whose 2.5-litre engine makes 182bhp and which has the same 180bhp front and 54bhp rear motor. And yet because it has an 18.1kWh li-ion battery (as well as the NiMH one), total power is 304bhp and there’s an electric-only range of 40 miles, with selectable hybrid or full EV mode and a 6.6kW battery charge speed.
Once the big battery’s depleted, it’s back to the regular hybrid system, as per the RX 350h. In our brief experience, it looked like it would probably manage that distance, too, albeit that was in hot weather. Keeping up? Then I’ll continue, to the car “for the most demanding petrolheads”, the RX 500h, which is sillier because it combines a turbocharged 2.4-litre engine (268bhp) directly linked to a single electric motor (another 86bhp) where the flywheel would be, with a single clutch between them and a six-speed automatic gearbox.
At the rear axle is a 102bhp electric motor, making a system total of 366bhp and 551lb ft. All of that means the RX can deliver either 256.8mpg (the cleanest PHEV) or 34.0mpg (the least clean RX 500). And thank heavens we don’t get the regular combusted RX 350 because I’m already halfway through this first drive. The rest of the RX is – also thankfully – similar between all models.
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