Selasa, 02 Juni 2009
Driven: 2009 Aston Martin V8 Vantage
Aston Martin may have been spun out of the Ford orbit, but a decade's worth of Ford investments in the British brand reveals itself the instant you open the doors to the 2009 Vantage roadster, an anti-Porsche 911 sports coupe or convertible with finesse and verve equal to its gorgeous custom-built aluminum body.
Aston provided a new Vantage for us to drive in Southern California recently, and within a few cloud-covered miles tooling away from LAX, the differences with other vaguely competitive supercars drew themselves neatly. The 911's heft, the Maserati Gran Turismo's lushness and the Nissan GT-R's raw ambition contrast heavily with the Vantage, down to its airliner-style bonded-aluminum body, to the LED lighting on the glovebox button. The Aston's unique in the group--a little less expensive and a little less fast than the 911 Turbo, a little pricier than the Maserati and the Audi R8 supercar. More a testament to exclusivity and understated details than unadulterated power, it's classically British, reserved but only to a degree.
There's plenty of power and great handling on tap, for the times when that reserve runs out. An upgraded 4.7-liter V-8 generates 420 hp of thrust, through a manual six-speed or automated manual gearbox. The Vantage's 0-60 mph time of 4.7 seconds trails 911 Turbos and GT-Rs, but makes sensual whirring noises to compensate. Our tester had the latter--and it's a half-step behind the times, like the old BMW SMG gearboxes that are being superseded by better dual-clutch trannies. While waiting for that upgrade, we're happy with the Aston's blend of user-selectable settings for steering, throttle, suspension and shifts. In either Comfort or Sport mode, the Aston bends pleasingly into canyon curves and needles through traffic with a fluid grace that's missing from just about any of the other cars in the range.