Back into Vantage ownership

[The Surveyor]

After a rather indifferent experience with a 2007 4.3 Vantage a few years ago which pretty much put me off manual gearboxes for life, and 4 wonderful years of McLaren ownership I’m back in a Vantage.

I’ve just bought this very nicely spaced Vantage and I’m totally smitten









There looks to be plenty of these available at the moment, but I think the new Vantage is very spec-sensitive. Even ignoring the amazing Flagflutz paint, the spec on this is just about perfect with the only thing I may change in the future are the side gills to black or carbon.

Couple of questions…
How long will these sit without a battery conditioner, and

The car came with 2 black plastic keys in the key box, were all cars delivered with a chrome key and a plastic one, or was the chrome key an option?

[4Q]

Stunning, love the colour.

[peteA]

Welcome back on board team Aston Martin Paul! The car looks stunning mate

[krisdelta]

Very nice indeed - these really stand out in a bold colour.

[cayman-black]

Congratulations, stunning colour.

[Phil74891]

Very nice!

Re the conditioner - I reckon a month would be ok if the battery is in good shape. But if you’ve got a garage and a conditioner, I’d keep it plugged in all the time.

[The Surveyor]

Phil74891 said:

Very nice!

Re the conditioner - I reckon a month would be ok if the battery is in good shape. But if you’ve got a garage and a conditioner, I’d keep it plugged in all the time.

Thanks, it didn’t come with a conditioner so I’ll have to buy one as there may be times when it doesn’t move for a week or two

[Phil74891]

The Surveyor said:

Phil74891 said:

Very nice!

Re the conditioner - I reckon a month would be ok if the battery is in good shape. But if you’ve got a garage and a conditioner, I’d keep it plugged in all the time.

Thanks, it didn’t come with a conditioner so I’ll have to buy one as there may be times when it doesn’t move for a week or two

I use a CTEK MXS 5.0 on my previous generation V12VS. Has worked perfectly for six years or more.

[ripley500]

Mine lasted about 8 weeks in the first lockdown before the battery went totally flat - kept in a garage. It was an absolute pain to get it going again. Had to leave it on conditioner for about 2-3 days before it would fire up. Anything over a month I would put it on trickle charge.

[GTRene]

lovely car, what I was wondering, are for this model no bucketseat options available like with the older model vantage?
not came across such when I looked into some not to pricy examples.

[sticks090460]

Very nice. No need to put on a trickle charger if you drive it!

[BigR]

Just purchased one myself, a 2 yr old in Cinnbar orange. Love driving it, however, its had a few issues with it, notably a couple of issues appearing on the dashboard regarding a fault with the lights and the handbrake. They cleared themselves but the garage is holding onto it to try and find the cause.

Reason for mentioning this is that it was suggested this could be because of low voltage as if you don't drive it for 2 or 3 days then the battery might flatten. I have to say this sounds like BS, as who would conceivably create a car that required plugging in every night (save for perhaps an EV of course!). I also call BS as I had a Vanquish V12S for a period and they said the same thing about that when it had a couple of early problems.

It sounds like others don't have those issues and can more or less treat it like any other car in this respect and perhaps the dealer is kind of reverting to a 'typical dealer' approach, which would be desperately disappointing.

By contrast I can leave my Lambo for a couple of months and it starts up as though it was driven only the day before.

[nathwraith1]

Lovely car and the colour looks epic! Agree with the above RE Ctek chargers, worth getting one if you don't use the car super often.

Check out Astonbits.com for plenty of new vantage goodies.

[dbs2000]

Thats a great spec, blue stitching is a winner