When Aston Martin was looking to buy a German V8 engine for its next Vantage sports car, maybe it should have considered BMW instead of Mercedes-AMG. I mean, just look at how the M5, a beefy sedan, takes it down!
Obviously, AMG and Aston have a long-standing collaboration, so it wouldn't have been nice to get BMW in on the action. The M177, which is the name of this 4-liter V8 that the Vantage uses, comes from the AMG GT.
It makes the same 510 horsepower in both applications, with the V8 Vantage also sending 685 Nm of 505 lb-ft of torque to the rear wheels. With 0 to 100 km/h taking 3.7 seconds, it's way faster than the old model. But we live in a world of monster German sedans which can obliterate everything with their performance.
One of the three monsters right now is the BMW M5, which puts out 625 HP with the Competition package. It also helps that more torque is produced by this 4.4-liter M bi-turbo engine. It's a burly-looking thing, quite heavy as well, but AWD is used to take care of power delivery, which was smart thinking on BMW's part.
The entire industry seems to be converging to AWD, as only McLaren is still able to offer high-end performance without it. You guys might be numb to the M5's performance, but it's important to point out that it has four doors, not two, plus a huge trunk compared to the Aston.
BMW doesn't get enough credit for its engines when you consider that the 3-liter bi-turbo from the M3/M4 is also better than anything with an AMG badge and six cylinders.
In the grand scheme of things, Aston Martin isn't losing anything by not having AWD. It basically sells every sports car it can make, and the V8 Vantage is their best work yet. But things will become more interesting once the DBX starts to do battle with the Urus.
Mihnea's favorite cars have already been built, the so-called modern classics from the '80s and '90s. He also loves local car culture from all over the world, so don't be surprised to see him getting excited about weird Japanese imports, low-rider VWs out of Germany, replicas from Russia or LS swaps down in Florida. Full profile
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