Aston Martin, the go-to brand when you think of a manufacturer to embody British motoring, will be outsourcing one of its most individual of attributes - the engine - from Mercedes-AMG in the shape of a turbocharged V8. A fact that’s not escaped many an enthusiast but could also be interpreted as the least scandalous among the other options.
So far, we’ve had no idea exactly which motor from Affalterbach will be living under the next Vantage, or how that might sound like. Shall Aston Martin relegate themselves to having their car sound like a Benz? Or would create a sonic identity unique to them in spite of the unoriginal components in the same fashion Pagani did with their AMG V12-powered Zonda and Huayra?
This video from Autoevolution showing a camouflaged next-generation Vantage exiting the Mercedes-Benz test facility at the Nurburgring Nordschleife and running some laps, gives us a clear impression of its V8, which sounds an awful lot like the M178 4.0-litre twin-turbo V8 used in the AMG GT (one of the Aston’s direct competitors) and the C 63 saloon and consequently should offer near-identical power and torque outputs.
Unlike AMG, though, Aston Martin has been a continued proponent of the manual gearbox, including it in their most recent driver-focused Vantages. The new engine will most certainly come as a pair with a 7-speed dual-clutch transmission (also from Mercedes-Benz), but Aston Martin could very well offer it with a clutch pedal too.
The grittier nature of the Aston’s previous V8s will indeed be missed, but the march of technology and the increasing expectation on fuel economy and emissions means that small but charismatic British automaker had to explore unusual solutions. The more surgical AMG motors, though, should serve as a more than adequate nicotine patch.
The next V8 Vantage looks, at least in this test mule form, to be a smaller version of the DB11. That might be intentional misleading, but Aston has done well to hide any newness from breaking cover prior to its sanctioned debut in 2018, assuming there are some. Even the wheels are directly from a DB11.
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