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Welcome then 'Big Ben', and like the famous bell, when this chaps hammer goes down and its pedal to the metal time, Ben too belts out just as an intimidating thump as his namesake.
Ben started life as a std 450 BHP manual DB9 which drove in @ 570 Nm / approx. 424 LBFT torque @ 5000 rpm with power output of 442.3 BHP at 6000 rpm.
Ben roared out @ 640 Nm / approx. 472 LBFT @ 5750 rpm / 556 BHP at 6500 rpm.
An improvement of approx 70Nm torque / 50 LBFT and a staggering improvement of 114BHP @ peak Vs peak power, but improvement area underneath the curve overall is just as impressive / perhaps more important in real world driving.
The brief was a pretty familiar one to us. Turn the DB9 up to eleven, exceed DBS performance and dynamic capability yet keep it looking standard and unmolested because a hot rod just wont do. We must keep it a Wolf in Sheep clothing so neither the wifey can spot the difference (read that spend!) nor will other 'performance cars' know what hit them pulling away from traffic lights, because instead of thinking Mr 'pipe and slippers' would be behind them, 'Big Ben' fills their cabin with V12 baritone howl and tyre dust.
But the most important criteria that must be fulfilled is the 'man maths', in the UK it works a little like this for DB9.
A 2005 DB9 with around 40k miles on the clock in good condition will fetch a trade-in value of around £25k (a dealer will resale for around £35k). A DBS or Virage will need around £80k to have it sitting pretty on the driveway, meaning that a 2005 DB9 + a chunk of change the thick end of £55k is required to own it. In say 3 years time that new DBS / Virage might too depreciate down to £50k and if the owner bought the original '05 DB9 new for £110k, means that in what will be 12 years ownership across 2 models using this example, around £115k would have 'disappeared'. In many cases, the owners of the early cars have no significant problem with interior / exterior worthy of trade-in which risks that hefty depreciation / loss, but they do want latest level performance and dynamic capability and is main temptation to trade-up and 'heart over head' live-with the depreciation / loss to get the better performance and dynamic capability car. This is where we step in to offer a different alternative, for around half the spend to trade up, we can do this;
Engine:
Bamford Rose V12 GT3 racing engine build with Blue printed and gas flow ported cylinder heads and larger inlet and exhaust valves.
High lift inlet camshafts.
DBS short runner inlet manifold.
DBS Sump.
Tuned equal length Exhaust headers / 200 cell density cats.
N400 / DBS style air box upgrade.
3 position Switch for manual control of exhaust bypass valves, fully open / fully closed or as per std switch speeds. Returning 99db loud mode / 82 db quiet mode.
ECU Remap.
Lightweight Flywheel.
Twinplate heavy duty organic material friction plate clutch.
Suspension;
DBS Steering rack
Electromagnetic switchable suspension system, track car mode stiff or GT cruiser along the freeway soft, both at an instant / press of the OEM button in the cabin.
Chassis stiffening plates front and rear.
Upgrade rear anti-roll bar and bushing.
Brakes:
350mm front discs / 4 piston caliper upgrade to 380mm discs 6 piston caliper
Wheels / tyres;
DBS 20 inch rims (this is what wifey thought the car came in for!)
Pirelli PZero tyres for the road / Pirelli Trofeo tyres for track
Exterior;
Union Jack badge (owners choice!)
Here is an example of the Bamford Rose V12 exhaust system, this set went on a 2013 Vanquish;
Here is an example of the high lift cam fitment on a project where the engine did not come out of the car. The engine was clearly removed for project Ben, but i can't display any internals;
The additional front tray fitted is the new section in black, older level cars do not have this tray and even sportspack cars which have additional trays, have trays of much thinner gauge. The front and rear tray upgrade really does tie the chassis in very well to give significantly more structural rigidity. When applied to a Volante the under surface trays completely remove the Volante 'wobble' that can be sensed because the roof is missing. With these trays and electronic suspension fitted to a Volante, it is hardly possible to differentiate between coupe or Volante any longer. This brings into perspective the chassis transformation achieved when the stiffening plates are fitted to a coupe. When combined with electromagnetic dampers, together with the roll bar upgrade, the combined package delivers track focused handling, yet at the press of a button the whole ride turns into comfy GT cruiser. The trays do not retro fit with ease, many brackets and fixings are required to update frames with to enable fit of the trays.
rear tray;
Close up of rear tray and the thick gauge plate used;
Whilst what the damper button does is obvious, the sport button switches between exhaust quiet / loud modes. These two buttons and hardware is what delivers two cars in one, Soft and quiet GT cruising or track focused snarling thunder;
Power is nothing without control, the big brake disc and caliper upgrade never suffers fade no matter how may times the brakes are applied from speed and give just as much wow factor when brake pedal is pressed as the wow factor from when gas pedal is pressed.
Here is transmission loss recorded for the DB9 manual gearbox, this is measured during coastdown on the dyno.
The trans loss is added to power at wheels to calculate power at flywheel. Trans loss is always give or take 10BHP, around 55BHP at 6500 rpm.
The std result here is about bang on we always see. With around 47BHP trans loss at peak power, the wheel figure being around 395, gives 442 at the flywheel compared against the book 450BHP
After all the hard work to rebuild the motor into GT3 spec, the after dyno gave the following;
Taking the same trans loss curve and adding to the wheel figure recorded above, we calculate the result of 640 Nm / approx. 472 LBFT @ 5750 rpm / 556 BHP at 6500 rpm. An improvement of approx 70Nm torque / 114BHP
So, gone are the pipe and slippers, this car beats a DBS in every dynamic measure. Hope you enjoyed the read!
Thank you for reading and please don’t hesitate to get in touch with either Bamford Rose or our approved US installer, British Automotive Repair Arizona should you want to know more.
Interesting write up, does the ECU need retuning because at WOT the engine is being ran from a hard coded map which is based upon original stock hardware?
AFAIK most cars use o2 sensor plus MAF for part throttle closed loop control of fuel and timing, some manufacturers use just MAF in open loop control during WOT (this would compensate for new hardware still) and some ignore the MAF also at WOT and default to a hardcoded fuel/timing map. Not sure what Astons do?
Interesting write up, does the ECU need retuning because at WOT the engine is being ran from a hard coded map which is based upon original stock hardware?
AFAIK most cars use o2 sensor plus MAF for part throttle closed loop control of fuel and timing, some manufacturers use just MAF in open loop control during WOT (this would compensate for new hardware still) and some ignore the MAF also at WOT and default to a hardcoded fuel/timing map. Not sure what Astons do?
Glad you found the project interesting.
yes, needs quite a bit of re tuning, but why do you think one map, the fuelling map as you state here is hard coded? Key thing to remember is that the ECU is an EPROM, meaning if one map or constant can be changed, they all can. So as in the case of this project, standard fuelling can be enleaned because primary cats are deleted and return more power from a lambda closer to max power / 0.89 lambda
when in closed loop, lambda adaptions across speed and load range are learnt to trim a fuel delivery value calculated from mass airflow. In open loop a target lambda value is requested from fuelling map and trims learnt at closed loop applied to deliver correct lambda. In open loop the oxygen sensors form no part of fuelling trim, in closed loop it is only the lambda sensor that controls fuelling trim.
Nice work... Bravo Bamford Rose well played! The tweaks and upgrades look wonderful and really add up to make a nice overall package change to the lovely DB9 ...
