Introducing the Lexus LY 650 Luxury Yacht

[krew]

Lexus to Release 65-Foot Luxury Yacht in 2019

This is crazy.

View the original article post

 

[krew]

I've since been told the Lexus yacht will be more in line with the Marquis 720 Fly Bridge:



Guess I'm the only one that thinks Lexus making a yacht is crazy news? :scream:

 

[Ian Schmidt]

For the people who wanted Lexus to make something more expensive than the LS and LC, their ship has literally come in

 

[krew]

This article from Daily Kanban is interesting:

Don’t expect rows of Lexus yachts floating out of an assembly line. Annual industry volume for 60+ft pleasure boats is a few hundred. They go for a few million on up. They also are alarmingly cyclical. The Wall Street tycoon who has everything buys boat of that size only once other avenues of spending money have been exhausted. Once the stock market turns, the boats flood Boattrader.com. Boats of that size usually have a crew. Many pleasure boat makers have been bankrupt at some point.

“The main goal is not the number of boats,” said Tomoyama, but the enhancement of the brand. Other carmakers have similar ideas. There is an Aston Martin speedboat, there is a wet Bugatti, and there is a race boat made for Daimler’s performance-offshoot AMG.

 

[mordecai]

The Champagne Gold color chosen for the Lexus yatch concept last year now makes sense with the context of the LF-1 concept. #elevate

 

[meth.ix]

Too much effort into something that not going to be produced

you thought wrong lol...

 

[mikeavelli]

So dope!!!!

 

[zeusus]

Too much effort into something that not going to be produced

Just wanted to take the time to point out and laugh at this post.

Great effort by Lexus. My gut feeling was that they were going to make something out of the concept and I'm happy that they are making it even bigger, wow!

 

[bogglo]

That yacht would be where lexus show out on their luxury touch.

 

[krew]

From Bloomberg:

Toyota Motor Corp.’s premium brand plans to start selling a 65-foot (20-meter) ultra-luxury yacht in the U.S. in the second half of next year. The vessel, announced at a boat show last week in Yokohama, will have room for 15 guests, three bedrooms with their own washrooms, plus separate quarters for crew. Executive Vice President Shigeki Tomoyama wouldn’t reveal the boat’s price, but said it will be comparable to others in its class. (Sunseeker’s 66-foot Manhattan goes for about $3 million.)

 

[Tragic Bronson]

Now that I think of it, two decades ago Toyota to did sell boats here as "Toyota Marine Sports", with their Epic line; it lasted about 3 years.

http://www.epicmarine.com/history.html

I didn't realize that they got back in the business with their lineup of Ponam boats with Land Cruiser engines. The insides are pretty nice, I wonder if TMC considered just rebadging them as Lexuses instead, since they don't seem to be sold outside of Japan.

https://jalopnik.com/toyota-built-a-275-000-boat-and-we-kind-of-love-it-1645832555

 

[krew]

krew

Lexus Announces LY 650 65-Foot Luxury Yacht

View the original article post

 

[Joaquin Ruhi]

Interesting to compare the original design rendering for the LY 650 (shown above, as first published by Bertel Schmitt of Daily Kanban) with the actual production yacht (shown below):

I would've hoped to see more current Lexus car styling cues show up on the production yacht, be it some spindle grille-like sculpturing on the bow or on the rear in the central "box" flanked by the entry steps on either side. On the other hand, the contour of the rearmost edge of the side windows could be construed as a vestigial arrowhead such as those found on a number of recent Lexus sedans.

At least the Lexus "Circle L" logo makes a notable appearance on the floor of the interior:

Other than what was lost in translation from rendering to prototype, the biggest surprise and disappointment is the loss of the multiple Lexus engines used on Toyota's previous Ponam and Epic boats in favor of twin Volvo (?!) IPS 1200 or optional IPS 1350 engines. Why??? Perhaps too many Lexus engines would've been required to power a yacht of this size and weight, to the detriment of packaging, space efficiency and power-to-weight ratio?

 

[Joaquin Ruhi]

...the biggest surprise and disappointment is the loss of the multiple Lexus engines used on Toyota's previous Ponam and Epic boats in favor of twin Volvo (?!) IPS 1200 or optional IPS 1350 engines. Why??? Perhaps too many Lexus engines would've been required to power a yacht of this size and weight, to the detriment of packaging, space efficiency and power-to-weight ratio?

That seems to be the case.

A visit to the Volvo Penta Marine website's IPS 1200 overview and specifications pages reveal that each engine is a 12.8-liter inline 6-cylinder diesel producing 900 hp. The overview describes it as using "a twin-entry turbo, and supercharger", while the specs (plus a Product Leaflet) speak in terms of a "dual stage turbo with twin charge air coolers". Each engine produces 3300 Nm (2434 lb/ft) of torque between roughly 900 and 1500 rpm. and fuel consumption is rated at nearly 170 liters per hour (45 U.S. gallons per hour) at the 2300 rpm redline. Oh, and each engine weighs 2300 kg (5060 lbs).

The optional IPS 1350 is essentially the IPS 1200 tuned to produce an extra 100 hp. More details and specs appear on their overview, Specifications and Product Leaflet pages.

 

[mordecai]

“The main goal is not the number of boats,” said Tomoyama, but the enhancement of the brand.

And it looks like it’s working so far. Just looking at Motor Trend’s Instagram account. The Lexus LY 650 post received 15,000 likes. The only other recent posts that have received that received around 15,000 likes are the Tesla Roadster, BMW M8, and next generation Corvette.

 

[spwolf]

it looks great, stunning even.... no wonder it has received great reception.

 

[isanatori]

This project can bring some attention to the brand, but the way it 's been evolving is depressing me.

I am going to draw some parallels among several projects that Toyota is developing right now.

First of all, I think what Lexus fans love in the brand is the state of art in-house genuine solutions the company employs into making things.

1. Toyota is a member of the Japanese consortium that is going to commercialize the first Japanese regional Jet (Mitsubishi Regional Jet) . This is a highly risky and difficult project.

2. Neither Toyota, nor Hino have any idea how to build an 8-class truck. Hino just released a prototype that wants to put into production.

Toyota have been developing the Mirai technology based on Hino competitors trucks and it seems they want to expand their business into hauling trucks.

3. Not long ago, Toyota sponsored the first hydrogen powered autonomous boat.

4. Toyota, until recently had been putting all their attention to hydrogen technology.

5. Toyota wants to raise the status of Lexus by bringing the brand name to glamorous world of yachts.

6. Toyota assigns:
-an expert US company to design and build the Lexus yacht.
-a competitor from China to bring their powertrain technology! Therefore, apart from financing, there's nothing else to relate Toyota/Lexus with the project!


Why Toyota did not follow the hauling truck thinking in this case?
[Deleted]

 

[ssun30]

^^If it's just about the brand image, why should they spend unnecessary resources in making a unnecessarily complex boat? It will be a white elephant project not dissimilar to Honda Jet.

The MRJ is a trainwreck at this point. Mitsubishi is the opposite of Toyota in corporate culture. They spend lavishly, have a bloated workforce, and operates based on an outdated Zaibatsu model from the 1920s. MHI is only alive because the Japanese government needs to keep it afloat for national security. Toyota should keep away from the company as much as possible.

 

[maiaramdan]

Nice, I love it
Actually it's amazingly awesome

 

[isanatori]

^^If it's just about the brand image, why should they spend unnecessary resources in making a unnecessarily complex boat? It will be a white elephant project not dissimilar to Honda Jet.

The MRJ is a trainwreck at this point. Mitsubishi is the opposite of Toyota in corporate culture. They spend lavishly, have a bloated workforce, and operates based on an outdated Zaibatsu model from the 1920s. MHI is only alive because the Japanese government needs to keep it afloat for national security. Toyota should keep away from the company as much as possible.

Ok. Forget Mitsubishi. I an not good at writing down my thoughts in a clear way. I apologize for the inconvenience and confusion.

Toyota could had bought a megayacht large enough to apply their MIRAI technology, carry an FCEV car, capable of refueling the FCEV, and helicopter landing. Then begin tests, before commercialization. But the final product should be a true Lexus.

Toyota should be recognized as capable of building zero emission mega-yachts.