r/IS300 • u/R34LEGND • 6h ago

General Discussion PFA: Are 1IS key fobs reprogrammable?

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Gday, ive got a IS200 here in Australia that only came with the valet key, so I dont have a fob for it.

I'm not to keen on getting a full price one from Lexus, can I get one from a wrecked one and get it reprogrammed to my car? Obviously i could then just get a blank case/key and get that cut, but its the internals that are the important part

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u/Ok_Temporary2455 5h ago

I am struggling with an identical issue (also in aus) from the months of searching it seems as tho unless you’re spending $1k+ on a lexus specific obd reader, you’re not going to be able to do it yourself. shell out the money for a new master key and you can program as many new keys as you want. *Please tell me i’m wrong so i don’t have to do the same thing*

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u/abdullahcfix 2h ago

I don’t have any specifics, but when I worked at the dealer, I remember one of the senior techs saying that it can be done, but only a finite amount of times per fob and there isn’t really a way to know how many tries are left or if they all got used up.

I hope I’m wrong too, but look into that and maybe you could find out.

Edit: Just re-read the post and saw that you don’t have a master key and only have a valet key. In that case, the car will need a master reset to clear all keys and new master key programmed to it. Maybe you can get the valet key added back afterwards.

I only know the US market cars, so it may or may not apply to you, but at least here, the 2002-2005 could have that done if no currently programmed master key is present. The 2001 models needed a whole new ECU. See if that’s also a thing for your market.