Yes sir,I do fish. My 23 is the catfish. The new one is the great white.

 

I, too, plan to keep my VH as long as possible. I'm beyond excited about the new Vantage—It's exactly what the brand needs—but I can never justify the massive depreciation that all new Astons experience.

So hopefully, some other folks in this group WILL consider one (in Buckinghamshire Green, please) and I'll be a proud second owner.

 

If anyone absolutely needs to get the new bigeyed vantage, wait for the second year as I've heard the info system which is the same as the DB12 is glitchy...

 

It’s getting crowded in the shelter….

 

Same with me, I'll keep mine and most likely it'll go to my oldest son, ( youngest will get the resto mod 70 Chevelle)
Configured one on Aston website in Buckinghamshire Green with oxford tan with carbon seats interior. That would be my choice . Definitely not worth 300K as someone specked it.

 

Yes 300K is going to be a tough sell. Especially when they will lose half their value after 2 years.

 

It seems that over the last few years that 200K was about the highest sticker I recall on any of the new generation Vantages. I am suprised to see that now that number can climb to 300K. It does seem that Aston is after the 911 Turbo customer.

 

In February of 2023 I bought my 991.2 911 Turbo S at a price that had depreciated approximately $1.45 per mile. In December of 2023 I bought my DB9.2 at a price that had depreciated about $8.75 per mile. Being respectively a 2017 and a 2015, they’re not all that far apart in model years.

Aston may be aiming at 911 Turbo buyers, and who knows, maybe the new Vantage comes within range in performance; but they’re far from proving a track record of value preservation.

Gratuitous picture attached 😁

 

Simple answer, yes I would purchase while keeping my VH platform Vantage in the collection.

 

Definite no from me. It's almost certainly a great car, and I truly hope it is. The new car looks a lot better inside and out IMO but, also IMO, the VH cars remain vastly better looking inside and out. To be fair, it would be extremely difficult to match them aesthetically. I think the VH cars also look and feel like they were much more expensive to build. Looks aren't why it's a definite no, however. There remains an absolute deal-breaker -- the Mercedes engine. It's a great engine, but the engine is the beating heart of a car and, for me, an Aston Martin must have an Aston Martin engine. End of story. I'd also want a manual gearbox, btw. Tellingly, and not surprisingly, the commenters who seem to be most taken by the new car already have a current-generation Vantage. I've had my '09 V8V from new, and I'm keeping it.

ram_g As we discussed elsewhere, IMO, it isn't that Astons lose their value more than most cars do. Rather, Ferraris and Porsches hold their value exceptionally well. Some of that makes sense to me, and some of it seems utterly absurd. Bentley, Rolls-Royce, Maserati, Jaguar, Mercedes, BMW, etc. all lose value at similar or worse rates than Astons do.

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I always thought the VH V8s were derived from a Ford AJ block and made at Ford's plant in Germany. I know Aston assembled them by hand, had their own displacement and used many VH-exclusive parts, but I don't see how that's much different from the AMG-sourced V8 in the current models.

For me, I prefer the response from the naturally aspirated engine.

 

IMO, the two situations aren't even in the same galaxy. No, Aston's 4.3/4.7 V8 aren't clean-sheet Aston engines like the Tadek Marek straight-6 and V8 are but, to me, they are Aston Martin engines. Completely re-engineering and redeveloping an engine that is "derived from" an existing engine is, IMO, completely different from buying an engine from someone else and installing it your car. Had Aston simply used the Jaguar 4.2 V8, "tuned" to their specs, it would be similar to what they're doing now with Benz engines. That's not even close to what they did.

Aston's V8 was "based on" Jaguar's AJ V8, but Aston then comprehensively redesigned it to create the 4.3/4.7 engines. To say that they "used many VH-exclusive parts" significantly understates how different these engines are. The Aston engines have their own bespoke block, crank, bearings, conrods, pistons, rings, heads, cams, valves, etc. Essentially, the Aston engines share nothing with the Jaguar engine. The Aston Martin Engine Plant that built them was a dedicated facility at the Ford plant in Cologne that was set up specifically and exclusively to build Aston Martin engines, and it was staffed only by people involved in building Aston engines.

The 4.3/4.7 V8 was developed specifically for Aston Martin, shares basically nothing with any other car's engine, and was only ever used in Aston Martins. In contrast, the AMG engines are precisely that -- AMG engines. They weren't designed by or for Aston, they're built by AMG just like all AMG engines are, and the engines themselves are exactly the same as those used in innumerable Mercedes cars (oil sumps, intakes and exhausts aren't part of the engine), etc. They're great engines, but there is nothing "Aston" about them. Even if the new version in the latest Vantage/DB12 may be more specifically "set up" for Aston, as I understand it there is literally nothing about the engine itself that is bespoke to Aston Martin -- it's entirely a Benz engine. IMO, that's a completely and totally different situation from the 4.3/4.7 V8s. To be clear, I have nothing against Benz engines -- they just don't belong in an Aston Martin. I wouldn't want an Aston with a Ferrari engine either, nor a Mercedes with an Aston engine.

 

This is awesome info! Thank you so much. I'll be much better informed at the next Cars & Coffee

 

The new engine for the new Vantage would not be an AMG engine. It would literally just be a regular M177 with "bespoke" turbo" "bespoke tuning" From C&D: "As with the previous model, the new Vantage's twin-turbo 4.0-liter V-8 has AMG DNA. But it's been significantly reworked for increased output with new turbos, revised cam profiles, optimized compression ratios, and improved cooling." What that means is its pretty much the same engine with more boost... For that I would be better off with the current vantage with the non catfish visuals with change to spare to just tune the AMG engine to comparable power. Even with that I'd still save at least 100k...

 

Well, yes, you’re not wrong (in my direct ownership experience) of the depreciation suffered by Jaguar, Mercedes, and BMW. But the difference is that a new DB12 now costs as much as a nice starter home in the Houston area and the thought of losing a good chunk of that in just a few years is daunting. If I’m going to invest that kind of money in a new “toy” it had better be something I can enjoy and then sell for approximately the same, ergo a high end Porsche or a starter Ferrari. (Bentley and RR don’t enter the thought process; I’m not young but I’m not senile either.)