Over the years, Aston Martin has built and released the Vantage GT4 for competition in European GT4 races. This year, the British automaker is releasing the newest version of the Vantage GT4, only this time, it’s bound to unleash its fury on American soil for the first time.
It’s an ideal time for the Aston to release the Vantage GT4 in the US, especially after its successful return year to the American LeMans series where it bagged wins with the Aston Martin DBR1-2 prototype in a number of races, including Long Beach, Mosport, Mid-Ohio, Road America, and Laguna Seca.
For the 2012 racing season, the Aston Martin Vantage GT4 will be built and raced by Toronto-based partner Multimatic Motorsports. The car itself will be re-dissected for racing purposes, which means that all of the luxury amenities of the road version will be removed in favor of race-spec equipment. Certain parts will also be added, including a new splitter that increases downforce at the front of the car, as well as a new carbon fiber diffuser, and a redesigned underfloor that creates an area of low pressure under the rear of the car, increasing the car’s overall downforce.
One thing that will remain with the car though is its 4.7-liter V8 engine, which Aston has used ever since it began building the Vantage GT4 back in 2008.
For the 2012 season, Multimatic Motorsports will be fielding two cars, which will be driven by some noted drivers, including Scott Maxwell, Joe Foster, Ston Martin, chief engineer Chris Porritt, and Hollywood actor-slash-racer Patrick Dempsey.
UPDATE 01/25/2012: Aston Martin has announced that the beginning of its Grand-Am campaign will be on Friday, January 27th during the first round of the 2012 Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge (CTSCC) at the Daytona International Speedway. The company will join forces with Toronto-based Multimatic Motorsports to enter a pair of Vantage GT4s in the Grand American Road Racing series. "The first round of the Grand-Am Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge at Daytona will see Aston Martin realize a long-held desire to have the Vantage GT4 competing regularly in North America. Aston Martin Racing has built and sold nearly 100 Vantage GT4s since we raced the first one at the Nürburgring 24 Hour race in 2006, and it’s great to be present at last in such an important market with such a strong and experienced partner as Multimatic."
Aston Martin is preparing to offer a facelift version for every model in the line-up thanks to that high interest loan they just secured from global investors. There’s already been talk of what will happen to the future DB9 debuting sometime next year, as well as a new DBS in late 2012. Now spy photographers have caught the future Vantage model testing near the Aston Martin technical center in Germany. The vehicle is still in the early stages of development, but it already hosts a number of changes that will significantly change the vehicle’s overall look.
The Aston Martin Vantage will not be a completely new vehicle as previously thought, but a facelift version including new and wider skirts and major changes in the body panels. That being said, these additions could have just been added to hide any changes made to the chassis of the vehicle. No other details have been offered, but it is believed that the exterior design will take its inspiration from the One-77 supercar with its borrowed bonnet, sides, and cooling vents, in an attempt to make the car look more aggressive and sporty. These changes may also supply a decrease in weight, by about 350 lbs.
The 2014 Vantage will more than likely be powered by the same 4.7-liter V-8 and 6.0-liter V-12 engines currently found in the sports car, possibly tweaked to deliver more power, better fuel economy, and lower emissions.
Expect to see the new Aston Martin Vantage in late 2013.
Just when it seemed a brand new collaboration was on the verge of rising, talks between Aston Martin and Daimler have been slowed almost to a halt. The two brands had an interest in working with each other because it would be mutually beneficial: Aston Martin would have helped in developing Maybach models and they would, in turn, be able to take advantage of Mercedes’ latest technology. Now, German publications have reported that this agreement has collapsed and, as a result, Aston Martin’s future is in grave danger.
The first Aston Martin vehicle to feel the heat may be the DB9 supercar. This model is built on the VH platform that was developed when Aston was owned by Ford Motor Co, but since a redesign is expected for the 2014 model year, Aston Martin finds itself scrambling for a new platform; one they thought they would be able to get from Daimler. The redesigned Vantage scheduled to come out in 2015 is in the same precarious situation, leaving Aston working doubletime to re-engineer the current platform, powertrain, and sheet metal.
The highly anticipated Lagonda models aren’t any safer. This bump in the road leaves their production entirely uncertain because the SUV was going to be built on the Mercedes GL platform and the sedan was supposed to use the Mercedes S-Class platform.
Aston Martin is completely at a loss, though. They just secured a £304 million bond - about $440 million at the current rates - from global investors at a rather high 9.25% interest over the next seven years. This money will be going towards designing all new platforms for their full line of sports cars, including the DB9, Vantage, and Rapide.
Investors are getting more and more strict when it comes to allowing people to borrow their money and it seems as if Aston Martin is getting the short end of that stick. The British sports car maker has secured a £304 million bond - about $440 million at the current rates - from global investors at a rather high 9.25% interest over the next seven years. That’s a 3-4% increase over the typical interest rate. Desperate or not, Aston Martin now has the money to design an all new platform for their full line of sports cars, including the DB9, Vantage and Rapide. Expect the new line to debut in 2015 or 2016 with the first details of the new design and production engineering showing up in a concept car sometime in 2012.
Before the British automaker moves to the new platform, however, their current VH platform will have to be modified to obey the new Federal FMVSS pedestrian impact rules. This re-engineered platform will be used for facelift versions of all three models. The new models will also benefit from new skin panels, revised interiors, and tweaked chassis and engines.
German tuning specialists, Wheelsandmore, have taken an Aston Martin Vantage V8 as their next project, giving the British supercar a well-rounded set of upgrades that include a new set of wheels, a new suspension, and a slight increase in power.
As the name of their company suggests, Wheelsandmore is no stranger to having some of the best rims on the market. For the Vantage V8, they decided to dress it up with a new set of handcrafted 21" three-piece 6Sporz² forged rims wrapped in 55/30/21 tires at the front, and 295/25/21 tires at the back. To go with the new set of gorgeous rims, Wheelsandmore also gave the Vantage V8 a new suspension kit courtesy of KW that comes with a rebound and compression adjustable stainless steel coilover suspension variant 3. Lastly, Wheelsandmore gave the supercar a new 200 sport catalysts and flip-controlled exhaust system, giving the Vantage’s 4.7 Liter V8 engine an increased output of 460 horsepower and 369 lb/ft of torque, up from the standard model’s 420-horsepower output.
All told, it’s not the most extravagant tuning program done on the Aston Martin Vantage. But in terms of subtle improvements all the way around, this is about as beautiful as it gets without going overboard.
