I stand corrected, and a little sadder....

 

Exactly...

Aston Martin seems to be resting on their laurels. They need to keep up.

Cadillac sedans are doing 0-60 in 4.5secs. They need to step up their game. There is no denial that the Astons are pleasurable for those cruises (I've been in one for 400 miles, very comfortably). They offer a thrill, but it is not longer the 'performance' machine that it used to be. I have no problem with the level of performance of them (just observing that they've peaked), but if they are not going to focus on performance, perhaps they could work on their reliability (or overall maintenance) to make them more attractive for people that don't have an Aston Martin dealership nearby (like me).

 

If they don't put more focus on performance in the next generation vantage,db or whatever, I don't think I'm buying another Aston.
Don't get me wrong I love my car but I will love it much more if I had more power.

 

I agree with most posts that its too similar to the DB9. The trend I hate the most is the tiptronic thats in most vehicles. the double clutch is sorely needed.

 

the truth is that the v8 should be doing 500+ hp, with direct injection, and the v12 should be doing 600+ but then who knows, maybe the next astons will be a v6 hybrid and v8 hybrid

 

God forbid. That will be the day I switch brands.

 

I wish some of the Cosworth work on the One-77 engine had trickled into the other engines. I would like to see direct injection. I bet the cuts in emissions and gas consumption would be enough to justify not doing the Cignet for corporate averages. Plus the power benefits would be nice, too.

 

they're doing the same thing with the DB9 that they did with the Vantage. adding a few enhancements to fill in gaps between their models (like the Vantage S slotting between the V8V and V12V). the Virage is basically just a DB9 S. that said, i think it's a waste of the company's resources. they should be putting these efforts into updating their existing lineup. the universal commentary for AM is that they lack power across the board. so why are they messing around with these little up-rated versions?

 

When is the Virage due to be released?

 

Maybe because that’s all their development budget is allowing right now?

They probably wait for some cash pouring in from the Maybach develeopment + arrival of free knowhow from AMG.

I still don’t understand though why they would introduce a new model which doesn’t bring anything new at all and somehow eliminates any lower emissions the Cygnet brings.

 

huh? did i miss something?

 

I think for car company like Aston to be profitable and long term, they are going to have to outsource the entire motor or block to different company. They seem long in the tooth on engine development. They have just been reworking the same V12 for a number of years and the V8 seems pretty archaic without direct injection, granted GM still uses pushrod motor but because the transmission they pull out good mpg and motor makes pretty good power. Like someone quoted earlier in the thread if they aren't going improve performance, at least improve reliability and fix all the electronic bugs

 

Yeah Aston is building the next Maybach for Mercedes and in the process they will be sharing some engines and platforms.

 

aston could really use those amg engines. the 6.3 liter in the e63 would be very welcome, look at that an 8 cyl with over 500hp and 13/20 fuel economy

 

BMW and MB have had discussions about sharing engines and other components. Its a natural way forward, we don't think too much about who makes a gearbox, or a starter motor, why should we care about who makes the engine, if it has the characteristics we want.

VAG already share engines across Lamborghini - Audi - Bentley - Volkwagen - Skoda - Seat, it means they recover the R&D and tooling costs across a greater number of cars. That works well within the family, so its now starting to happen with the neighbours