Discussion
I have an R8 Spyder courtesy car while my V12V is in for repair. (the insurers' selected hire company really didn't like the amendments I made to their documentation 
)
In terms of pure speed, it feels very much like a V8V or S, lacking the immediacy of the V12V. The V10 would I expect compare much better with the V12V. The engine sounds great. It's not better than any Aston engine in that respect, but it's obviously closest to the V8V.
The four wheel drive and mid-engine make for rather different handling characteristics. If I don't get the V12V back by the weekend, I'll be driving the R8 in the Yorkshire Dales, so I'll have proper experience of it, but for now, I'd say that the steering is very good, nit better, but different. The four wheel drive makes it less likely to understeer, but what you gain there, you lose in not having a rear end that can be used to help steer. Some probably like the fact that it feels impossible to unstick. I prefer RWD characteristics.
The ride is much more compliant thatn my V12V, but it crashes on bumps. It is not as low, so the speedbumps on my commute don't hold the fear I have when in the Aston.
I'd love to have tried the manual, with its open gate, but this one has the dual clutch box. It is very good. Occasionally, it stumbles on changes down in slow traffic, but changes up are jerk-free and seamless.
The packaging makes an Aston V8 Roadster look positively practical. The boot is tiny and there is virtually no interior storage space. Even those hollows behind the seats in the Roadster would help. Instead, there are three minuscule lockers.
The interior is nothing special. Lots of people rave about Audi interiors, but they do nothing for me. There's a textured material on the dash with stitching. It is probably leather, but I'm not sure. No such doubts would ever arise in the case of an Aston. The SatNav is abysmal, worse even than the Volvo system (really, I am not exaggerating here). The MMI system that some claim to be much better than BMW iDrive is terrible.It is not intuitive in the least, but clunky and difficult to navigate around. Apart form the gear lever, the controls are plasticky and lack the quality feel of the Aston controls. The controls in our Astons that we hate are the column stalks, so I expected the Audi to beat the Aston here. It doesn't. They feel equally flimsy.
As for looks, well, it's not an Aston. It's an Audi and, even though it's the only one not based on a front wheel drive platform, it still has an ungainly front overhang.
So far, I like the car and am impressed with it, but I would never consider buying one over an Aston.
)In terms of pure speed, it feels very much like a V8V or S, lacking the immediacy of the V12V. The V10 would I expect compare much better with the V12V. The engine sounds great. It's not better than any Aston engine in that respect, but it's obviously closest to the V8V.
The four wheel drive and mid-engine make for rather different handling characteristics. If I don't get the V12V back by the weekend, I'll be driving the R8 in the Yorkshire Dales, so I'll have proper experience of it, but for now, I'd say that the steering is very good, nit better, but different. The four wheel drive makes it less likely to understeer, but what you gain there, you lose in not having a rear end that can be used to help steer. Some probably like the fact that it feels impossible to unstick. I prefer RWD characteristics.
The ride is much more compliant thatn my V12V, but it crashes on bumps. It is not as low, so the speedbumps on my commute don't hold the fear I have when in the Aston.
I'd love to have tried the manual, with its open gate, but this one has the dual clutch box. It is very good. Occasionally, it stumbles on changes down in slow traffic, but changes up are jerk-free and seamless.
The packaging makes an Aston V8 Roadster look positively practical. The boot is tiny and there is virtually no interior storage space. Even those hollows behind the seats in the Roadster would help. Instead, there are three minuscule lockers.
The interior is nothing special. Lots of people rave about Audi interiors, but they do nothing for me. There's a textured material on the dash with stitching. It is probably leather, but I'm not sure. No such doubts would ever arise in the case of an Aston. The SatNav is abysmal, worse even than the Volvo system (really, I am not exaggerating here). The MMI system that some claim to be much better than BMW iDrive is terrible.It is not intuitive in the least, but clunky and difficult to navigate around. Apart form the gear lever, the controls are plasticky and lack the quality feel of the Aston controls. The controls in our Astons that we hate are the column stalks, so I expected the Audi to beat the Aston here. It doesn't. They feel equally flimsy.
As for looks, well, it's not an Aston. It's an Audi and, even though it's the only one not based on a front wheel drive platform, it still has an ungainly front overhang.
So far, I like the car and am impressed with it, but I would never consider buying one over an Aston.
Interesting comparison Zod, thanks for the write up. I've only sat in one, not had the pleasure of a drive, but having had a succesion of S Audis, what struck me about the interior was that I felt as though I could be sitting in any Audi, not the flagship sports model. It felt exactly the same as all the others, with only minor ammendments. Now, i'm sure that the same could be said about the AM range, but they are all premier cars, whereas if blindfolded and put into any Audi, I'd probably struggle to guess which one I was in.
I suspect if you had to have one car only and say if you had no garage, the Audi makes a much more sensible proposition than any AML. It will most likely stand up to big commuter mileages (25k+ p.a.) many times better than the Aston - that for me is one of the R8's big strengths, it's all round ability & practicality (space issues aside)
Plus, the bottom price for an R8 of c. £40k seems to have held firm for 3 or 4 yrs now !
But if you run a 2nd car, you want it to feel completely different and special compared to your DD - that's where the R8 loses for me - it's special from the outside, but from the inside, in looks and then then when driving in feel, it's just another Audi......and I say that as an Audi fan with an Audi as my DD
Plus, the bottom price for an R8 of c. £40k seems to have held firm for 3 or 4 yrs now !
But if you run a 2nd car, you want it to feel completely different and special compared to your DD - that's where the R8 loses for me - it's special from the outside, but from the inside, in looks and then then when driving in feel, it's just another Audi......and I say that as an Audi fan with an Audi as my DD
jonby said:
I suspect if you had to have one car only and say if you had no garage, the Audi makes a much more sensible proposition than any AML. It will most likely stand up to big commuter mileages (25k+ p.a.) many times better than the Aston - that for me is one of the R8's big strengths, it's all round ability & practicality (space issues aside)
That's a curious viewpoint. On what particular factors have you found the Audi to be more sensible day-to-day? On the subject of garages, I have been surprised to find that the Audi is an utter pain to get into my garage compared with the V12V. I haven't quite worked out why yet. It has a much bigger front overhang and a longer wheelbase (but only by two inches) and it is only two inches longer.
jazzyjeff said:
jonby said:
I suspect if you had to have one car only and say if you had no garage, the Audi makes a much more sensible proposition than any AML. It will most likely stand up to big commuter mileages (25k+ p.a.) many times better than the Aston - that for me is one of the R8's big strengths, it's all round ability & practicality (space issues aside)
That's a curious viewpoint. On what particular factors have you found the Audi to be more sensible day-to-day? But I suspect the interior & exterior of an Aston doing 25k+ miles p.a. in every type of weather condition and that is not garaged would look much worse than an Audi doing the same thing. I suspect running costs including fuel, insurance, servicing & depreciation would be much less in the Audi. An R8 is hardly discrete but there would be occasions I'd be more comfortable in the Audi than in an Aston, from certain client meetings to certain types of shops.
You then get to weather conditions - I drove to Milton Keynes & back from Manchester yesterday and it was raining pretty much the entire way, lot of traffic, dark for much of it too - I was in the car for around 6 hours total, with a 3 hour meeting inbetween. I was on hands free for a number of phone calls. I listened to the radio inbetween. I would not have enjoyed that journey in my Aston, in particular visibility, handling in the rain with those tyres & 2WD, rubbish hands free & even more rubbish radio reception but I don't imagine in an R8 it would have been much different to in my A7.
I'm sure plenty of people do use an Aston as their DD but I suspect not many use a V12V that's not garaged and does a significant mileage as their DD.
jonby said:
To be clear, my DD is an Audi saloon
But I suspect the interior & exterior of an Aston doing 25k+ miles p.a. in every type of weather condition and that is not garaged would look much worse than an Audi doing the same thing. I suspect running costs including fuel, insurance, servicing & depreciation would be much less in the Audi. An R8 is hardly discrete but there would be occasions I'd be more comfortable in the Audi than in an Aston, from certain client meetings to certain types of shops.
You then get to weather conditions - I drove to Milton Keynes & back from Manchester yesterday and it was raining pretty much the entire way, lot of traffic, dark for much of it too - I was in the car for around 6 hours total, with a 3 hour meeting inbetween. I was on hands free for a number of phone calls. I listened to the radio inbetween. I would not have enjoyed that journey in my Aston, in particular visibility, handling in the rain with those tyres & 2WD, rubbish hands free & even more rubbish radio reception but I don't imagine in an R8 it would have been much different to in my A7.
I'm sure plenty of people do use an Aston as their DD but I suspect not many use a V12V that's not garaged and does a significant mileage as their DD.
When I was searching for my current car I looked at both R8s and Vantages with higher mileages to get an idea of what they would be like after several years in my possesion and the R8s faired much worse than the Vantages. Interiors on the R8 seem to decline very rapidly which was a surprise for an Audi.But I suspect the interior & exterior of an Aston doing 25k+ miles p.a. in every type of weather condition and that is not garaged would look much worse than an Audi doing the same thing. I suspect running costs including fuel, insurance, servicing & depreciation would be much less in the Audi. An R8 is hardly discrete but there would be occasions I'd be more comfortable in the Audi than in an Aston, from certain client meetings to certain types of shops.
You then get to weather conditions - I drove to Milton Keynes & back from Manchester yesterday and it was raining pretty much the entire way, lot of traffic, dark for much of it too - I was in the car for around 6 hours total, with a 3 hour meeting inbetween. I was on hands free for a number of phone calls. I listened to the radio inbetween. I would not have enjoyed that journey in my Aston, in particular visibility, handling in the rain with those tyres & 2WD, rubbish hands free & even more rubbish radio reception but I don't imagine in an R8 it would have been much different to in my A7.
I'm sure plenty of people do use an Aston as their DD but I suspect not many use a V12V that's not garaged and does a significant mileage as their DD.
There is no doubt the R8 is a very capable machine, we have driven one in a back to back test with Evo magazine. In fact against 14 of its principal rivals the R8 came out top on the day. What it lacked for us was that despite its overall competence it just didn't feel special ! As Binz has said it is just like any other Audi. The very name Aston Martin sums up specialness. We consider ourselves very fortunate to own ours 
robgt said:
There is no doubt the R8 is a very capable machine, we have driven one in a back to back test with Evo magazine. In fact against 14 of its principal rivals the R8 came out top on the day. What it lacked for us was that despite its overall competence it just didn't feel special ! As Binz has said it is just like any other Audi. The very name Aston Martin sums up specialness. We consider ourselves very fortunate to own ours
Completely agree. It's looking like I'll be taking the R8 up to Yorkshire this weekend, because the insurers haven't approved my Aston repairs yet, so it will have a good chance to sho its worth, but I expect the conclusion to be just the same as yours. I have to bow to superior specific knowledge on the R8 so thanks for sharing the experience - my experience is based on ownership of several audis (my A5 looked fresh as a daisy after 80 odd thousand hard miles in 4 yrs) but not ownership of an R8 - I had assumed, as I imagine many others would, that the R8 would be similar but as I say, others have more specific personal experience
I still wouldn't want a V12V as a DD doing 20k miles p.a., including a good number of business miles :-)
I still wouldn't want a V12V as a DD doing 20k miles p.a., including a good number of business miles :-)
jonby said:
I have to bow to superior specific knowledge on the R8 so thanks for sharing the experience - my experience is based on ownership of several audis (my A5 looked fresh as a daisy after 80 odd thousand hard miles in 4 yrs) but not ownership of an R8 - I had assumed, as I imagine many others would, that the R8 would be similar but as I say, others have more specific personal experience
I still wouldn't want a V12V as a DD doing 20k miles p.a., including a good number of business miles :-)
Yes, 20k would probably be excessive. I have done 11k in mine in 26 months and that feels like a lot.I still wouldn't want a V12V as a DD doing 20k miles p.a., including a good number of business miles :-)
Gassing Station | Aston Martin | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff