Background

The first Aston Martin DBS V8 rolled off the Newport Pagnell production line on 19th September 1969. For Tadek Marek it was the public debut for his new engine and the car received a rapturous welcome from the public. The engine used the same light aluminium alloy construction as the old straight six and used a similar design for the valve gear employing two chain driven overhead camshafts per cylinder bank and two valves per cylinder. The 8 wet liner cylinders were in a V formation set at 90 degrees with fuel and air were supplied via a Bosch mechanical fuel injection system with the injector pump in the middle of the cylinder vee and eight separate throttle butterflies mounted outboard of each induction port. The engine had five main bearings and the cooling system was with thermostat, water pump and viscous-coupling fan.  Putting this newly developed engine into the body that had been created for it gave Aston Martin a car that carried four people in luxury, weighed well over one and  a half tons, yet could accelerate from 0 - 60 mph in less than 6 seconds and had a top speed of 160 mph.  Every aspect of the car needed superlatives for its description. With that weight and speed, the Girling brakes had to produce substantial stopping power - I ¼ inches thick front and rear, they were ventilated and had two independent hydraulic circuits to provide pressure to front and rear and the rear brakes had separate callipers for the handbrake.  Unusually, Aston Martin made standard the fitment of specially made 15 inch alloy wheels with 7 inch rims. Another innovation was the introduction, as an option, of Chrysler's Torqueflite 3 speed automatic transmission - already a fitment of the competing Jensen, it perhaps reflected the consideration by Aston Martin, over a period of time, to buy in an American V8 rather than persist with the home grown product.  Testing the car, a contemporary road test by Autocar noted the flexibility of the new V8 engine at the bottom end of its wide range. They noted that the torque curve was surprisingly flat noting that in fifth gear, the 20 mile per hour increments from 30 mph to 110 mph each took around 4 seconds less than the straight six it had tested the year before.  They also noted that the clutch, having to cope with all the extra torque, was heavier than the six cylinder - they measured that it needed 50 pounds of force to depress the pedal.  Handling and grip had been improved on the DBS with the de Dion rear axle - in the DBS V8, Aston Martin went one better with the addition of Pirelli Cinturato GR 70 VR radial tyres on the new alloy wheels. Aston Martin offered air conditioning on the DBS V8 as an option costing £385.14 and, by the Motor Show in 1971, this was a standard fitment. It was during the lifetime of this model that a great association ended for Aston Martin. Sir David Brown had bought Aston Martin in 1947 for £20,500, and in 1971, he sold the company to Company Developments, a Midlands based investment company, for an undisclosed sum. A simple sentence that does no justice to the achievements of his 25 year stewardship. The establishment of Aston Martin as a leading marque in the top flight of luxury sports cars. Aston Martin had delivered victor's laurels on the track with victories at Le Mans and in the World Sports Car Championship and astonishingly, it had delivered three major car lines - DB2, DB4 and DBS - each with a brand new engine. The DBS V8 was the last Aston Martin to carry the initials of Sir David Brown, and is now considered the "Series l V8". It was the first British car with an alloy body and its own V8 engine represented a massive legacy from David Brown. It was a model that continued for many years and an engine that survived in production for over thirty years.

Vehicle History: This car appears in the AMOC Register and is said to be the Geneva Show Car of 1971.