The New Aston Martin Vanquish visits Kuala Lumpur

Aston Martin Kuala Lumpur recently previewed their latest V12 Grand Tourer, the Aston Martin Vanquish at their showroom recently. It was in Singapore prior to this, and was in town for a few days before making its way upwards towards Japan if I heard correctly. The Vanquish, a pre-production car was shown to prospective customers, current Aston Martin owners and members of the media.

The new Aston Martin Vanquish replaces the outgoing Aston Martin DBS. It's exterior styling is an evolution of the DBS with styling cues from the limited production Aston Martin One-77 (the roof pattern, side strakes etc.) but underneath, according to Aston Martin, the new car features a whole slew of changes and new stuff.

The new Vanquish gets the latest Aston Martin VH (Vertical Horizontal) Chassis and utilises a heck of a lot of carbon fiber throughout the car. What I am impressed is the rear bootlid - one technician at the Aston factory will take two days to hand lay individual carbon fiber to create a somewhat impossible looking integrated rear spoiler and bootlid. It is a marvel to look at, more so if you have some idea on how carbon fiber parts are made. And since I do, it is truly remarkable.

And you also see small touches like the pattern on the roof of the car. Small details that make the Vanquish something nice to spend an hour or two just to look at the darn thing. The exposed carbon fiber front splitter and rear diffuser are also works of art although I feel the car shows too much naked carbon fiber for my liking. I have an opinion that modern supercars show too much unpainted aero parts until it actually detracts from the overall shape of the car.

According to Aston Martin, the Vanquish gets a reworked 6.0liter V12 engine - 11.5:0 compression ratio making 565bhp and 620Nm. The transmission used is a straightforward 6 speed torque convertor automatic running through an open differential. Somehow Aston Martin reckons that customers want something more relaxing to tour with instead of a Ferrari chasing kind of car. This means that Aston Martin isn't building this car to chase Ferrari's new F12 with its 6.3liter 700bhp V12. It makes sense, as Aston Martin, now mostly owned by some Arab based investment company does not have bottomless pockets like Ferrari. But in all honesty, anything with 500bhp isn't small potato. Anything that costs over RM2.48 million should never be considered chicken feed in the first place.

So what is an Aston Martin Vanquish? A gentleman's carriage. Something to cross the continent in total style and comfort with some speed to boot. What a normal Aston Martin Vanquish customer in these parts of the world would usually do is take the Vanquish to the office and back and then take his V12 Ferrari up Genting Highlands for his kicks. Now this is what the people at Aston Martin are telling me. And I somehow agree with that they're saying. Malaysians (and Singaporeans) who own Astons do own both cars. So in a sense, Aston isn't competing with Ferrari. And with the Vanquish, it shows that they're not going to. And I do believe if James Bond were to use this car, it wouldn't let him down.

Sensible chaps, the people at Aston Martin. Oh. One final detail which I do like about the new Vanquish. It actually has more headroom, legroom and more room compared to the outgoing DBS. Chubby customers should rejoice.

- Fabulous hour glass style stitching option for the seats.