The History of Aston Martin

Aston Martin has been producing truly British top-class sports cars throughout its 100-year history. Founded by Lionel Martin and Richard Bamford in 1913, this company built racing cars and sold their road versions in small quantities. It remained little-known until 1947, when it was purchased along with the Lagonda brand by David Brown. The combination of Aston Martin's tubular chassis and Lagonda's powerful 6-cylinder engines became the basis for the famous DB series models.

In the 70s and 80s, Aston Martin went through an economic crisis and a change of several owners, and then from 1994 to 2006 it was part of Ford. Since 2012 the owner of Aston Martin is the Italian fund Investindustrial. The concept of a luxurious, powerful, hand-assembled GT class car, formed by David Brown, still exists today. In addition to two-door sports cars, the Aston Martin lineup also includes the expensive Rapide sports sedan.

Despite the fact that the brand Aston Martin for the first time in a long time began to bring profit, Ford put it up for auction because of financial problems. The consortium Prodrive headed by David Richards, which included the Kuwaiti firms Investment Dar and Adeem Investment, became the buyer for $848 million.

In the same year, the Aston Martin DBS supercar was launched into production. It was based on a common platform with the DB9, but had a lightweight two-seat body, a 5.9-liter V12 engine with 510 hp and carbon-ceramic brakes.

As part of a partnership with Magna Steyr at the plant in Graz (Austria), for two years Aston Martin Rapide sports sedan - a 4-door version of the Aston Martin DB9 - was produced. Later its production was moved to Haydon.

The Aston Martin One-77 hypercar was presented at the Geneva Motor Show. The combination of a carbon monocoque, aluminum body, and atmospheric V12 engine of 7312 cm3 volume and 750 h.p. power, located behind the front axle, made it the fastest car in the history of the company. Seventy-seven cars were produced in two years.

After its debut at the Geneva Motor Show, the Aston Martin DB11, a four-seat GT-class car, hand-built in the best British traditions, went on sale. It originally got a twin-turbocharged V12 engine with 5204 cc and 608 hp, complete with an eight-speed ZF automatic transmission. A convertible Volante and a cheaper version with a 4-liter V8 engine from Mercedes-AMG with 510 hp followed in 2017.

The second generation of the younger Aston Martin Vantage model comes to the market. Stylistically, the car resembles the Aston Martin DB10 concept car, made in 2014 especially for the filming of the movie 'Spectre'. Under the hood there is a twin-turbocharged V8 AMG engine with the volume of 3982 cm3 and the output of 510 hp paired with a 7-speed manual or 8-speed automatic gearbox. Do not forget to use Aston Martin VIN decoder in order to avoid potential problems when buying a used car.