I saw an Altezza on the road the other day. I tried searching for info on it but didn't learn much. Is it a Lexus version not sold in the U.S.?

 

Altezza is the Japanese equivalent to the Lexus IS300, it is made by Toyota, and is widely responsible for over 90% of riced out Civic tailights (hehe) what you may have seen was an IS300 with JDM badges, kinda' the thing to do now with the whole "import craze" etc., If I see one more 240sx with Silvia badges and stickers everywhere I may have to hurl :D

 

Yeah, unless it was right hand drive, you saw an IS300 with an altezza badge on it. I've seen one before too

 

from what i know it is actually 2l and not 3l

 

someone plays gt3 lol.

 

haha not reaallllyyyy...frm where i come from we don't have the 3l IS but 2l IS, the altezza is extactly the same as an IS but theres just a swap of the front grill and a few parts here & there...and its a manual

 

It's just an Altezza badge? That's hilarious!
This car wasn't all riced up. In a way, I can kinda, sorta understand why people rice their cars -- they like the looks. But why pretend your car is just some other vehicle?

Maybe I'll get a Yukon badge for my '8 so people will think I'm driving an SUV.

 

This clears up the mystery of why, when I searched for Altezza, I got a bunch of Japanese-language websites with pictures of ugly taillights.

 

Yeah, the Altezza is just an IS300. People adopted that name to use for their super cool clear tail lights.

 

I had those lights on my accord...they looked a lot better than the stock ones though. The "altezza" I saw was nothing more than a black onyx IS300 with the L's and "IS300" taken off and toyota emblems and "altezza" put on. The steering wheel still had the L on it

 

I've seen Lexus SC300/400 with Toyota Soarer badges and Aristo badges on the Lexus GSs.

 

holy crap that's funny, me coming from a custom car background would either leave the factory ones on there, or just shave them off. I don't see why all these folks want to try and make their car appear to be something else, as soon as you spot the left hand drive you know it's a fake anyway, to make matters worse I have seen a right hand drive converted civic with oem domestic badges etc. and the dude was talking it up like "my ride is tight yo". Kind of reminded me of if you were to paint a car, and then leave a fender unfinished or something, makes no sense, hence my "silvia" comment earlier, I see all these jdm badges (is apc making these now? wtf are they like EVERYwhere now??) on us cars, plus they're not even in the right place a lot of the time, like the true jdm model might have the badge from the factory on the right back corner and then some kook will have it on the left etc.. I guess to sum things up here's 2 things, the first is that "it is still the same car" so why try and make it something it's not? the second is seeing type r stickers on pickup trucks, I didn't know GM partnered with Honda to produce a "type r" silverado/tahoe/whatever? funny how that vtec in those sound an awful lot like a chevy engine, must be the dual exhaust gives it away? I know that this new stuff is supposed to be our generation's "hotrod era", but dang can't these dudes take a lesson from the old days? were there guys back in the day that were putting mustang emblems on camaros? or were they slapping "427" stickers on their cars when they maybe only had a 289 etc.? I don't think so. :D

 

I hear ya.

I've also read about kids who try to rice up their cars with decals -- but they put on decals that say "VTEK" -- that's right, with a "K." This has to be the international symbol for "dumbass."

 

It's like a dumbass flag...they put it up to attract other dumbasses

 

the saddest part about the whole v-tec thing is that it is actually not a bad engine, too bad all the wannabe's have given it a bad name, kinda like how they did with the srt-4, that little car is crazy, but they priced it so cheap all the morons can afford one :D

 

Update: I just saw another "Altezza" today -- with ugly taillights and an "Altezza" license frame. But thanks to this thread, I had a good laugh this time.

 

I think,and are pretty sure,that the Altezza only comes with RHD.
Here in Europe there are some import cars from Japan in England,but newcar dealers in England only sold it as the Lexus IS.
Lexus has not been sold in Japan,but they're starting this year...

http://www.toyota.co.jp/en/news/04/0526.html

The Altezza came in Japan with two different engines.
The fastest sounds a bit fun

The RS200 gets the "BEAMS" 3S-GE Dual VVT-i 4 Cyl engine. 1.998L 154kw (210PS) about 210 HP @ 7,600 rpm (6 spd M or 5 spd Auto)

The AS200 gets the "BEAMS" 1G-FE Dual VVT-i 6 Cyl engine. 1.988L 118kw (160PS) about 160 HP @ 6,200 rpm (6 spd M or 4 spd Auto)

 

And that's why the IS300 doesn't handle so well. It was designed for a 2.0L engine, but Toyota decided it needed to drop in a 3L to compete with BMW in the US...