Toyota may recall Lexus LS460 on faulty engine: report

DETROIT (Reuters) - Toyota Motor Corp is considering recall of one of its top-of-the-line sedans, Lexus LS460, owing to concerns that its engines may stall, the Nikkei business daily reported.

Tens of thousands of vehicles will likely be recalled worldwide, the daily said without naming sources.

The Nikkei said the 4.6-liter engine of the sedan, launched in 2006 and partly remodeled last year, is said to stall while the vehicle is in motion and may not start again.

Lexus U.S. officials said the carmaker is investigating the issue but did not say whether the luxury sedan would be recalled.

If the LS460 is recalled, it would be the latest in a string of recalls for Toyota since last fall. Since last September, Toyota has recalled more than 10 million vehicles worldwide, most for the potential of unintended acceleration.

Just last Friday, Lexus told U.S. safety regulators it was halting sales and recalling about 17,000 Lexus HS250h gasoline-electric hybrid sedans due to a potential fuel leak. Toyota acted after a U.S. government crash test that showed fuel leaking after an HS250h was struck from the rear by a car traveling about 50 miles per hour (80 kilometers per hour).

About 13,000 model year 2010 HS250h vehicles were sold in the United States, and about 17,000 have been built to sell in the U.S. market, Toyota told its U.S. Lexus dealers in a letter last Friday.

Toyota's own crash test did not show the fuel leak problem. The automaker, in the letter to U.S. Lexus dealers, said it was trying to understand why the government tests showed the fuel leakage problem while the company's own crash tests did not.

The automaker told dealers it has not received any reports of injuries or accidents linked to the potential problem with the HS250h sedan. And Nikkei reported that Toyota said there were no reported accidents related to the 460LS issue, either.

Toyota is investigating the cause and would likely need to replace engine-related parts or upgrade control software, the daily said.

Lexus sold 4,863 of the 460LS sedans in the first five months of this year in the United States, up from 3,925 units in the same period in 2009.

Lexus through May had sold 5,889 of the HS250h in the United States. The model had yet to be introduced by May last year.

(Reporting by Koustav Samanta in Bangalore and Bernie Woodall in Detroit; Editing by Don Sebastian and Steve Orlofsky)