2nd best day- drove a AstonMartin V8Vantage - tech-upd. 1.2.
 

Today was my 2nd best (car related) day ever !

edit, full report and pics. I'm happy to share my impressions with you guys, still blown away from this drive :D


BEFORE
http://images6.theimagehosting.com/Dsc07636800.jpg


AFTER
http://images6.theimagehosting.com/Dsc07663800.jpg




edit


arriving with my Seat, the V8 was already parked infront of the showroom... what a beautiful car :shock:
http://images6.theimagehosting.com/Dsc07626.jpg

many of you will remember, that I liked the yellow one from Geneva05 very much ("young"-"sportif"- "Lambo-rival")
http://img261.imageshack.us/img261/2...10182pv.th.jpg

but IMO this darkblue color is just perfect to this car with the tan-brown- leather inside :drool:
http://img9.imageshack.us/img9/282/v...uren9sk.th.jpg (thanks Wutputt for the pic :wink:)

the design of the car is anyway to die for, the shape, the rims, the head-n-rear light ... :love:
a combination of elegance and racing


Cockpit
http://img56.imageshack.us/img56/975...kpit4rb.th.jpg
taken from AM homepage, go to http://www.astonmartin.com/thegallery/brochures for all details

the interiour is, as you can expect from AM, top quality; simple, but clear intruments, awesome illumination of the instruments, a quite big middle part with cd-player, Nav.system, as you can see in the picture above, and of course, the START ENGINE button


Sitting in the car, one has a good overview, the seat are sportif tight. The view out of the windows is surprisingly good, you have a very good field of view towards the side, the back-side windows gives you enough view to see any car next to you. Looking thru the middle-mirror, you see enough what's going on behind you.
But you don't see the front end or the back end of the car, so parking could be tricky if not used to the dimensions of the car -
but who cares about parking this car :roll:


let's go !!
the dealer told me that they openend the valve-flaps in the exhaust to have a proper sound also from low revs on :good:
Since the testdrive was on normal road (f.king Zürich has installed houndreds of radars in the city -arrrrg- -> 50km/h in town, 120km/h on the highway was the max. speed :bah:) no high acceleration, high revs

So, starting the engine was cool but as the whole car, some british understatement is in it ( compared to the marvellous start-up of a Gallardo SE or Murci), but one is aware of the power...
btw, the Power-Beauty-Soul on the display appeared -> see TopGear episode, where JC complained about :lol:

first, we drove out of the city, stop-n-go traffic.
The car is very easy to drive in the city traffic, it's a 6gear manual car btw, the gears are very smooth, no problem with the clutch
because of the cold weather, the gearchange was a little tricky at the beginning, but changing from 1 into 4th gear by mistake at a low speed was fine

from this point of view, the V8 is an all-day car for sure! one can cruise at low revs, the seats are confortable, in-style-cruising :)


then, we followed a curved road, where suddenly, we passed a Mercedes SLR :wink: , probabely coming back from a testdrive, because their showroom is very close. It's the first one I saw drivign in the while btw :wink: the color was standard, silver-grey (to answer vakpemil's question in the thread)

Driving up this road, I was able to push the car a little more :D
Now, the "racing" attitude appears :love:

The set-up of the car is the best I've driven so far, the steering is direct, agile, the suspension is "hard" enough to let you feel the road. You can take the corner very precise while you hear the beautiful sound of the V8 engine.
I haven't driven many sportscars, but the handling of the V8 is impressive :D , IMO they did a good job with midmounted front engine, the transaxle gearbox and the stiff Aluminium body
I didn't even came near the full capacity of the car, it's pure pleasure to drive in the open raod with this car :drool::drool::drool::drool::drool::drool:

compared to the Lambos, which hamlet and I drove in Frankfurt:
well, the lambos are pure sportscar, every thing (from the start-up) to the alcantara-steering wheel) can be described: flat, wide, aggressive, powerful, loud - like a bull
of course, the Lambos have more power (520hp for the SE, 580hp for the Murci) than the V8 with still 380hp, but also the rest of the car is sports-oriented. Well,the Gallardo can be seen as an allday car, the Murci not.

The V8Vantage however is both, and it's not a all a bad compromise.
IMO the engineers managed to built a car which can be driven all day and for many hundreds of miles, but still it's a proper sportscar!
I engine could be stronger, most probabely there will be a more powerful version in the future...
The V8Vantage can be discribed: stylish, agile, exclusiv, understatement



:bah: very soon, the next village arrived and via the highway we drove back to where we started.
I had the intention to stop somewhere to shoot a sereis of pictures, but at the beginning I was focused on the driving and towards the end, we drove on the highway :?

So the only pics I have can be seen below, IMO this car is a beauty :love:, the color suits perfect...

all I need is 170k CHF :drool:





Enjoy the picture :D

before, :P
http://img85.imageshack.us/img85/661...76247ix.th.jpghttp://img85.imageshack.us/img85/138...76329zg.th.jpghttp://img85.imageshack.us/img85/525...76360rm.th.jpg

after, :D
http://img56.imageshack.us/img56/568...76993wf.th.jpghttp://img85.imageshack.us/img85/705...76424fu.th.jpghttp://img56.imageshack.us/img56/853...77656jh.th.jpg:drool:


the car
http://img85.imageshack.us/img85/669...76456aj.th.jpghttp://img85.imageshack.us/img85/191...76638nv.th.jpghttp://img85.imageshack.us/img85/270...76618nr.th.jpg

http://img56.imageshack.us/img56/237...77015nq.th.jpghttp://img85.imageshack.us/img85/908...76388bp.th.jpghttp://img56.imageshack.us/img56/113/dsc076952wl.th.jpg


details
http://images6.theimagehosting.com/Dsc07672b800.jpg
http://img56.imageshack.us/img56/240...76937of.th.jpghttp://img85.imageshack.us/img85/833...76540xg.th.jpghttp://img85.imageshack.us/img85/165...76579yu.th.jpg

http://img56.imageshack.us/img56/421/dsc076767oq.th.jpghttp://img85.imageshack.us/img85/219...76656gl.th.jpghttp://img56.imageshack.us/img56/286...76720ub.th.jpg

logo
http://images6.theimagehosting.com/Dsc07657logo800.jpg
http://img85.imageshack.us/img85/340...logo6nj.th.jpg

EDIT: 2.2.06

to answer the questions you guys asked:

1. the color is called "midnight blue" :love:
2. the rims/tyres are the winterset for the V8Vantage in 18"



8)

I guessed it from your siagnature, and already congrats!! Very nice shade of blue too! I am starting to see AMV8 on a regular basis in Geneva (well, went there twice in the last two week and saw two of them LOL), and in the wild it's a damn nice machine!

I hope you were able to stop in a nice location to take some quick shots ;)

wow, looks stunning in that color :shock:
must've been a great test drive. I assume a salesman was with you, but did you get a chance to do some hard accelerations and hard cornering?

The best color combo for a V8 IMO. I am waiting for more soon mate :wink:

Amazing pictures! The AM V8 vantage is stunning!

lol, another teaser, aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa :lol:

will comment when i see the whole thing 8) :mrgreen:

EDIT

ˇˇ :lol:

You drove it yourself??? :P

That car looks damn good, and your pictures are awesome! Can't wait to hear the details & see more pics. :D

Gorgeous car - still nice and rare round here though 8)

A fantastic 2nd pic - can't wait to see the rest, and hear more driving impressions from you too :D

AMV8 looks great, looking forward to more pics

What a car, I once saw one a couple months back in bordeau but it looked awefull next to a dark blue Vanquish, just like this one actually. But it must have been the color because I loe the looks of this car.

That colour is perfect for it, I love it!!! :D

Congrats on the drive, can't wait for details.

Congrats stmoritzer ... you are one lucky bastard! I absolutely love this car, and everytime I see it I like it even more...I really can't wait to see it in real life.

Lucky guy..... Lucky guy!!! This car is so perfect...! The lines.... :drool: so sophisticated!

Congrats stmoritzer for your exclusive AMV8 test drive ! :clap:

When I saw Hamlet here in Québec he spoke to me a lot about your mutual best (car related) day ever. When you have a gentleman attitude with exotic car dealers you can get sometimes very exclusive surprise. :wink:

The teaser pix looks really good and I like the color of the AMV8 with the tan interior. :good:

I'm anxious to see the rest of your pictures ! :wink: