Let’s be honest about this, £13,000 probably isn’t a lot of money to your average Aston
Martin DB11 owner. £13,000 is probably what they’d spend on wheels and trim and a stereo
and a celestial roof lining but £70,000, I think 70 grand would get your average Aston
owner’s attention. And £13,000 may be the difference, if you’re living in the UK,
between a V12 and this new V8 engine DB11 but if you’re subject to the Chinese taxation
system, it’s £70,000. So the Aston DB11 V8 is the first Aston to use an AMG engine,
part of a deal that was done 4 years ago and they’ve been working on for quite some time.
It’s the same V8 engine that you’ll find in an AMG GT except it’s dressed and tuned
slightly differently. This car has just over 500 horsepower, a V12 just under 600 I think.
That seems like quite a lot to separate them but there’s more between these two cars
than just engine and power, the next critical difference between an Aston Martin DB11 V8
and a V12 is weight. This car weighs 115 kg less than a V12 and that’s a result not
only of the engine being lighter but because it needs one less radiator. If you look at
the difference between the cars on paper in terms of performance it’s only a tenth of
a second on a standing start to 62 mph but the really important thing is that this engine
produces only 18lb ft of torque less than the V12, so if you account for the weight
saving, this car actually has more torque to weight than the 12-Cylinder car and on
the road that is exactly how it feels under your foot. The way this engine revs between
3000 and 5000 rpm, which is where you spend most of your time on the road, really is very
impressive. There’s a lot of usable power here and when you’re doing things like driving
down the road, overtaking, speeding up for motorways, that sort of stuff, this car feels
every bit as quick as the 12-cylinder one does. It sounds pretty great as well, perhaps
not like a V12 Aston Martin, granted and a little bit like an AMG C63 or an AMG GT, but
there are differences in the way this car sounds compared to the AMG applications. Aston’s
been very careful in tuning the exhaust, tuning the intake, making its own audio signature
and there’s no system tuning going on with the audio system in here but apparently there
is in AMG’s these days so what you’re hearing is all engine noise and it’s a little
bit more subtle, a little bit smoother than you get in your average AMG and it suits the
car down to the ground, doesn’t sound as good as an old Vantage V8 but it’s getting
there. Big front engine GT cars are often about how much confidence you can have in
the front axle, once you get a feel for the grip level you can really enjoy cars like
this but you can’t always do that because some of them are a little bit too soft and
over isolated. For me, the DB11 V12 was a little bit like that, it was just a little
bit soft but this V8 version it steers with a lot more weight and a lot more precision
and feel than the V12 does so you just get a much clearer idea of what the front wheels
are doing and how much grip you’ve got. The car's body control is much better too
so the ride is tauter and better damped and you also end up with better feel for the rear
of the car because you’ve got more confidence in the front and you’ve got that ability
to push on a little bit and get a feel for the grip levels. You just end up having so
much more fun and being much more involved driving this car than you really ever did
with the V12. It’s got that sporting GT feel that an Aston Martin should have in my
book and it’s also got so much breadth of ability as well so several driving modes,
those adaptive dampers can be nice and compliant if you want them to be and it can cruise almost
as well as the V12, I dare say but it’s got so much more going on as a driver's car.
So get ready for the big cliche, is less actually more in the DB11’s case? Well yes, I think
it is, given that fewer cylinders is actually giving you better handling, more driver focus,
almost as much performance, more usable torque and more budget to spend on options, why wouldn’t
it be? To me, this is just a better DB11, it’s as simple as that and if accepting
that ends up putting you in the minority where Aston Martin owners are concerned,
well I don’t think I’d care much.