![]() In the USA, folk almost exclusively learn to drive in automatics. In Europe, it’s customary to learn to drive in a manual car (stick shift), not everyone does but most people pass their driving tests in a manual. But it’s the way each market took to manual cars that is surprising. The second country for sales was North America with 220. The British market was especially strong for the DBS Volante with 276 sold. ![]() What we found particularly intriguing is the markets these cars were sold to. Manual DBS Volantes are super rare by comparison with only 44 examples delivered worldwide, representing a smidgen over 5% of production. This represents almost 39% of the production run. We now know that the DBS coupe manual isn’t especially rare hard to come by certainly, but not especially rare with almost 1000 examples sold. By May 2011, whilst the manual gearbox derivative remained available to order, the Touchtronic 2 became the standard transmission and the price of the manual was adjusted upwards to match. At launch, the manual transmission was standard fit, the Touchtronic 2 box was a cost extra. Now this is where it starts to get interesting. The split is 323 RHD to 522 LHD (38.2% RHD, the coupe is 36.5% RHD). Left-hand drive cars predominate as expected with a split almost identical to the coupe. It’s not just the diminished legroom but shoulder room is tight too. Those back seats are terribly tight so as to be almost superfluous. It was simply not possible to order lightweight seats or 2 + 0 configuration although I have no doubt some cars will have been converted by Works or another coach builder into a pure two-seater. This is the European press demonstrator, E11235 in Hammerhead Silver, and if you look closely, it’s being driven by Marek Reichman, Director of Design at AML – Photo by Tim CottinghamĪll DBS Volante were built with 2 + 2 seating using the standard sports seats as the only option. Seating Configuration The Hotel de France is a well-known meeting place for Aston Martins. ![]() Following this, a rare oversight occurred at AML that allowed a further 24 Volantes to be sold with E0****chassis number, all of which were special editions. AML records now show it may have subsequently been changed to E11213 prior to sale. ![]() To begin with, the Geneva launch Volante had a coupe chassis number, E01028 as witnessed at the time. Except that it’s even not quite that easy either. Or to make it easier to understand, E00010 is a coupe, E11213 is a Volante. Thus, the way to differentiate between the coupe and Volante VIN is that the coupe has a ‘0’ in position 13 whereas the Volante has a ‘1’. So, A = DB9 coupe, B = DB9 Volante and so on. This is unusual as both before and since, it has been more customary for coupe and Volante derivatives to have different letters in position 12. VIN InformationĪll DBS and DBS Volantes have the letter E in position 12. This is not a great number at all as the cars are well spread around the globe making them a rare show at any Club event. So, you will be unsurprised to hear that DBS Volante production only reached 845 cars in total over three model years (MY). In the last article covering the coupe car ( AM Quarterly, Summer 2018), we noted that DBS production was held back by the ongoing financial crisis. It is one of only eight UK cars with a manual gearbox – Photo by Tim Cottingham This particular car was used during the press launch and was famously driven by Jeremy Clarkson in Romania on a feature on BBC’s Top Gear. ![]() So, the DBS V12 Volante is another shining example of this rare combination. Who can resist the pull of a DB4 convertible with the GT engine, the late 1980s overly bespoilered V8 Vantage Volante or the super-rare 1999 supercharged Vantage Volante Special Edition. This isn’t something that AML always offer, but when they do the results are always spectacular and instantly desirable. Whilst the coupe was a direct replacement for the Vanquish S, the DBS Volante represented a combination that AML had not offered for 10 years by putting their most powerful engine in their flagship open car. The DBS V12 coupe had been in production for over a year when the Volante version was first shown at the 2009 Geneva Motor Show. ![]()
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