FWIW, I have a 2006 DB9 that lives in my garage. I have an inexpensive trickle charger from Black & Decker (BMB3). I attached a pigtail to power/ground in the engine bay. When I return to the garage I open the hood and plug it in. I leave the hood up to let the engine cool off. Once cool, I lower the hood. The electronics appreciate the hood being up, the battery likes the trickle charge...

 

I ended up buying the CTEK 5.0. Now I have a stupid question since I've never owned a car with the battery located under the rear seat. Please don't laugh at me, lol. The sales person told me that there were a couple of different ways to hook up a trickle charger, but I want to make sure I'm doing this correctly so I've attached a pic of the front engine bay. Is the best/easiest thing to do simply to attach the positive cable to the bolt located under the black "+" box & the negative to one of the frame bolts in the blue circle in the pic? And then after I plug in the CTEK, should I close the hood or just leave it up for the 3 weeks that we'll be gone? Again, sorry if this is a stupid question.

 

Positive to the post under the "+" lid -- squeeze the lid to release the catch. I clamp the negative cable to the alternator bracket. Don't know about the bolt you've circled -- might work.

I wouldn't trust the struts to hold the hood up for an extended period. I've had old ones give out after a couple of hours, sending the hood crashing down. I now use a short scrap of wood to block the hood latch and just rest the hood on it. Keeps it open a couple of inches, just enough to clear the positive clamp.

 

The bolt you circled has loc-tite on the threads and kinda stubborn to remove. There is 2 10mm headed bolts on the beam where your positive terminal is mounted to they have support brackets at an angle. That would keep your wire run to minium.

 

My thanks to both of you. Much appreciated..

 

It's actually super easy to get to the battery in the back seat. Takes less than 5 or 6 minutes to get to it and hook up the charger. I'm in NC for the summer and my car is back home in Indiana on the charger hooked directly to the battery as I type this. .

FWIW, YMMV

 

Hi, any update on the DB9? Did we trade it in because I see its for sale again. Why did you get rid of it?

 

Im looking at the same thing! Very intriguing.

 

Wow, that was pretty quick; I just traded the car in Friday afternoon and it is already listed for sale. Also, very surprising considering its current condition as I'll explain below. But first, in answer to your question, the reason I got rid of the car was two-fold: #1) I decided that buying a car with the closest service department being almost 300 miles away was a mistake; and #2) I was completely and utterly disappointed and frustrated with most of my interactions with the AM dealer in Orlando, starting with when I purchased the car and up to and including dealing with the service department last week. I'll go through some of the issues, which admittedly, I should have been more assertive about when they occured.

It started even before I purchased the car when I had trouble even getting the wiring instructions due to a lack of communication between the salesman and the finance office. IIRC, I finally had to get the sales manager involved (who, btw, has been great the entire time I owned the car) so that I could complete the sale. Then when I traveled down to Orlando to pick up the car, it wasn't until after I signed the paperwork that I found out that the car only came with one key. Then, not only was I told that it would cost ~$2k for a valet key (or $500 for an emergency key), but the parts department didn't even have either in stock. If I wanted to order the valet key, I'd have to drive back down 300 miles when it came in to pick it up and have it programmed. My salesman then gave me the name & number of the parts manager.

The salesman then brought the car around to the front of the dealership for me to pick up and drive home. But when he got out of the front seat he noted that the tinting on the rear window was failing and that it was difficult to see out through the rear view mirror. So much for the car being inspected thoroughly for the CPO process. I'm sure that they didn't do a damn thing other than pay the money for the Timeless warrenty. I had a choice whether to spend the night in a nearby hotel while the rear window was retinted, or drive it home in that condition and have it done locally. I chose to do the latter, although in retrospect, it wasn't very safe to drive that car in that condition.

Getting back to the key issue, I called the parts manager and ordered a second key. I went back-and-forth with him for over two months in telephone calls and emails, even so far as to give him my credit card info. There was always some excuse as to why the key hadn't been received by their dealership from AM. After another month had gone by with no contact, I learned that the parts manager no longer worked there. Coincidentally, I found out that my salesman no longer worked at that dealership either. At that point, I decided that I'd just make do with the one (glass) key.

Now on to the (relatively minor) car issues. In the fall, my check engine light and "Emissions System Service Required" message came on. I pulled the code and found it was the O2 sensors. When I contacted the dealership, I was told that as long as the engine wasn't misfiring, I could just continue to drive the car as is until I was scheduled to bring the car in for its regular annual service in a few months. Also during the fall, I noticed that the piping on the dashboard was coming apart and needed to be restitched. So after the holidays, I called the dealership and made an appointment to have all these issues taken care of during the week of January 24th. I even specifically asked if they repair the piping and I was told that they had someone inhouse to do that. I told the service manager that I'd be in first thing that Monday morning.

My wife and I drove down on Sunday and I went straight to the dealership early Monday morning. The first thing I was told was that the stitching repair would need to be rescheduled because they actually didn't have anyone on staff and it needed to be sent out to be completed. Moreover, that process would take 7-10 days because they'd have to take the dashboard completely apart to repair the one inch of piping that had come loose. I was also told that it would probably cost $3k-$4k. I said fine, I'll deal with that at some other time and to just take care of the routine maintenance and the O2 sensors. I then left the car and took my wife to Universal for the day.

When I didn't hear anything back by Tuesday morning, I called and left a voicemail for the service person to call me to give me an update on a possible ETA for when the car would be ready. When I didn't hear anything back by late that afternoon, I called again, had him paged, and then found out that after two full days, they hadn't even bothered to look at the car yet! I then called the sales manager who contacted the service manager who apologized profusely and promised that the car would be taken care of on Wednesday. At COB on Wednesday, I was told that the car would be ready Thursday morning. And by ready, I mean that the annual service was done, but the O2 sensors weren't replaced. I was informed that they pulled a "soft" code for the sensors but not a "hard" code (whatever that means) and the warning light and message had gone off so they couldn't be replaced under warranty. I was told to bring the car back when the check engine light and message reappeared.

Two days after I returned to Savannah, the check engine light and emissions system service required message reappeared and stayed on for several weeks, so I made an appointment to bring the car back down to Orlando last week. (To be fair, the service manager said that if I was going to get the stitching repaired at the same time, he'd have the vehicle transported to Orlando, but I wasn't ready to be without the car for 2 weeks). When I made the appointment, I was told that it would probably take two days to complete the repair. This time I drove down on Monday, dropped off the car that afternoon, and expected to pick it up by COB Wednesday. Wednesday afternoon, my service tech called me and told me that they got the appropriate code to be able to replace 2 rear sensors, but they now had to contact the warranty company and get authorization to do the repair. Moreover, they would then need to order the parts (!!!). So once again, I would need to drive home to Savannah and then drive back down to Orlando for a third time to finally have the sensors replaced.

It was at this point that I finally decided that I had had enough, and that I needed to develop a relationship with a dealership that serviced cars closer to where I live. When I went to pick up my DB9 last Thursday morning, I noticed a Porsche dealership directly across the highway from AM. And Porsche has a dealership (Hilton Head) 45 minutes from my home. So I drove over to Porsche Orlando South intending to just get an idea what they had available, with the intention of perhaps buying a car at the end of March when I planned to return to Orlando to have the O2 sensors finally replaced. I ended up taking a 2025 Panamera on a test drive, while at the same time getting an appraisal on the DB9. I pointed out the issues with the stitching, as well as explaining that at least 2 of the O2 sensors needed to be replaced by AM. I got some preliminary numbers and went back to my hotel. Since Friday was the last day of the month, they were willing to work with me on the price, as well as accept the DB9 without me having getting it repaired first.

So I picked up the Panamera late Friday afternoon and drove back to the hotel and then on to Savannah on Saturday. I just assumed that the Porshe dealer would send my DB9 to auction, so I was surprised when I received an email notification that this thread had been updated and found your responses indicating that the DB9 was listed for sale by the Porsche dealer.

TL;DR: I enjoyed driving the DB9, but having to drive close to 300 miles to an AM dealership whenever I had issues was just too much of a hassle, so I traded the AM in for a Porsche.

 

Having a decent dealership, both when buying the car, and servicing it, is so critical. You would think that a brand like Aston Martin, with so few dealerships, would make sure they are all good, but no-so-much.

In addition, its starting to also require having an independent mechanic you can count on because the prices at the AM dealers for doing simple maintenance is getting absurd.

 

I always think that working on my own car is just cheaper, but I don't value the fact that I don't have to deal with the parts dept, service dept and their rules from corporate. The Pananmera is a great car, you will love it. If you ever want to jump back in an Aston, I am in Charleston but spend a day a month in Savanna, I am happy to work on your car in the future for a beer.

 

AM Orlando is generally regarded as good dealership with good service and customer service. This story is disappointing

Congrats on the Porsche

 

The indy Aston Martin specialist near me buys parts from O'Gara instead of the local AM dealership. Better stock, service, and prices. They order parts just about weekly.