PH has an Aston Martin Vanquish on test at the moment. There’s a full UK verdict to follow, but hopefully it won’t come as too much of a surprise to discover that it’s pretty fabulous; the praise heaped upon the V12 last year was more than justified. Now Aston’s 12Cilindri rival is available as a soft-top Volante, 25 years since the first V12 Volante (the DB7 Vantage) and 60 years from the first Aston Martin to use that moniker (the Short Chassis, an extremely rare 37-unit run that blended bits of the DB5 and 6.)
Given how the Coupe has been received, and how the DB12 equivalent turned out, there’s cause to be very excited about the Vanquish Volante. The new roof mechanism – a K-fold system, rather than the Vantage Roadster Z-fold setup – can drop in 14 seconds and rise again in 16, at up to 31mph. Not as speedy as the V8, then, but surely swift enough should a shower strike. The boot capacity is 219 litres with the roof up, and 187 with it down, compared to 248 for the coupe. Like the Vantage, the stack height of the canvas roof is relatively low (260mm), meaning that there’s no interruption ‘to the seamless flowing lines of the body’. Thermal insulation is said to be top drawer, and the exhaust has been redone for maximum V12 glory whatever the configuration. A titanium system, saving 10kg and promising the ‘ultimate aural experience’, is optional.
The Volante weighs 106kg more than the Vanquish Coupe (1,774kg vs. 1,880kg dry). While that’s more even than the old DBS soft top (1,863kg dry), it does mean less of a gain compared to the hardtop (previously the Superleggera piled on 170kg in the transition). Aston is promising a 75 per cent increase in lateral stiffness ‘over the previous flagship convertible’, thanks to some additional strengthening underneath, which is encouraging given the old DBS was actually a very smart handling convertible. This is reckoned to be closely matched to the Coupe in terms of structural rigidity, with a revised setup for the Bilstein DTX dampers (on account of the weight bump) about the most significant change that’s been divulged.
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As with the standard Vanquish, there are GT, Sport and Sport Plus drive modes for the Volante, plus an Individual option. Aston believes that GT has been ‘configured to breathe with the road, providing that long-legged, effortless character that are the hallmarks of the very best Grand Tourers’, with the more aggressive settings there to amp up response and theatre.
Certainly the 5.2-litre, twin-turbo V12 should provide plenty of the latter, here once more with a monster 835hp and 738lb ft for 214mph flat out. Those numbers mean Aston can claim the title of the world’s most powerful and fastest front-engined convertible, as a 12Cilindri can only muster 830hp and 211mph. The Vanquish reaches 62mph in 3.4 seconds, or just a tenth slower than the Coupe, though it’ll surely be from there that the Vanquish begins to feel really very rapid indeed.
The same technology and equipment that have made the V12 flagship stand out already have made it to the Volante. Which makes sense, of course, given both were developed together. These features include a bespoke compound of Pirelli P Zero (in both summer and winter forms), the variable traction control and e-diff that can lock up in 135 milliseconds, plus standard ceramic brakes that are said to be 27kg lighter than the equivalent iron rotors. The press release reads exactly how you’d hope for a V12 cabrio of this billing, suggesting that the new diff is capable of ‘providing greater agility in low and medium speed cornering whilst offering greater control in oversteer and high-speed lane change conditions’, which sounds excellent. ‘The desire to provide Vanquish Volante with the same supercar-levels of driving dynamics, combined with the ride refinement required from a flagship, with effortless capability that mandated the fitment of the sophisticated chassis system seen on all series production Aston Martins.’
The two-seat interior is largely carried over from the Vanquish to the Volante, which for probably the first time in V12 Volante history (perhaps bar the early DB9s, when that cabin looked cool) is news to be welcomed. The pair of 10.25-inch screens look good, as do the rich materials and physical switches, here joined by one more for the roof. The Sports Plus Seat is standard, with carbon chairs on the extras list, and the 15-speaker Bowers & Wilkins audio system has been tuned specifically for the convertible installation.
All sounds pretty great thus far, chiefly as so much is carried over from the Vanquish Coupe. And that’s without mentioning the best bit: how the Volante looks. So cohesive and so arresting is the design that it almost seems like coupe followed convertible, rather than the other way around. Surely those keen on the Kamm tail drama of the Vanquish will love this. Indeed Chief Creative Officer Marek Reichmann calls it nothing less than ‘the crown jewel’ in Aston’s line up.
Though an exact launch date hasn’t been announced, first orders for the Vanquish Volante can’t be very far away given summer is on the horizon. Expect a price to mirror the Ferrari equivalent, much as the Coupe does, so in the region of £360,000 before any options. A significant step up from the £250k of a DBS, then, but this Volante does promise a significant step up in the experience as well. CEO Adrian Hallmark added: “For 60 years, Aston Martin Volantes have defined the art of elegant, sporting, open-top motoring. With its stunning looks and outstanding V12 engine producing more power than any other front-engine production car on sale, Vanquish Volante has taken this philosophy to an entirely new level. At Aston Martin we are proud to be doing such justice to our heritage while, as the unprecedented performance of the Vanquish Volante shows, keeping our eyes firmly focused on the future.”