Entry-level sports car finally breaks cover after its direct predecessor had to soldier on for 12 years.
That’s quite a long time…
Yes it is, especially by standards of the modern automotive industry. The Aston Martin Vantage you see here in official pictures is the all-new successor to the model that was made from 2005-2017.
To be sold as a model for 2018, the new Vantage comes with a design similar to the DB10 movie car driven by James Bond. Note the wavier surfaces, sleeker front lights and the trendy, wide horizontal rear lamps.
The Vantage is based around the same space frame concept as in the DB11 but with a 100mm shorter wheelbase, at 2,708mm. That’s because the Vantage is a two-seater and doesn’t need as much metal between the front and rear axles as the four-seat DB11. Even so, the Vantage is also bigger than before by the same margin.
The Vantage tips the scales at 1,580kg, almost 100kg lighter than the DB11, but some 30kg more than the outgoing model when specified with V8 power.
Does that V8 come from Mercedes?
Yes it does. Under a technical collaboration with Mercedes-Benz’s AMG high-performance car division, the Vantage gets the same 4.0-litre twin-turbo V8 used in several AMG applications like the GT sports car family and some super-fast C- and E-class models.
In fact, the first Aston to gain on this AMG-fettled eight-pot is the DB11. The Vantage’s power is rated at 510hp and 685Nm. It also gets the brand’s own eight-speed torque-converter rather than seven-speed dual-clutch unit used by AMG.
The Vantage goes from 0-100kph in 3.6sec, a full second quicker than the previous model which saw 430hp 4.7-litre naturally aspirated V8 and dated single-clutch automatic combination.
Will it cost more than before?
The new Vantage will cost around 17 million baht in Thailand, considerably more than the preceding model that once asked for three million baht less. Essentially, the Vantage is in the price territory of the Mercedes-AMG GT and Porsche 911 GTS; the DB11 competes in the 20-25 million baht territory.
The V8-powered Vantage will only be the beginning for the Aston Martin’s entry-level sports car. Expect all kinds of variants to appear in the following years including an open-top Roadster, V12 based on the brand’s latest 5.2-litre unit (as seen in the DB11 developing over 600hp), track-inspired GT and extreme AMR Pro outfits.
