In the early 1960s Sean Connery graced our screens in the Aston Martin DB5 quickly making it one of the most famous cars ever produced. Both films, Goldfinger and Thunderball had James Bond driving his enemies off the roads with the gadget loaded car.
Film makers asked Aston Martin to provide the next James Bond car and were given the opportunity to use the new Aston Martin DB5 even though it hadn't been released yet. The earlier DB MkIII was the car Ian Fleming had envisaged in his novel Goldfinger, but the film makers were happy to upgrade James car, and this was a decision which gave birth to a legend.
The DB5 had evolved from the DB4 which was very similar, but didn't have the headlight covers. The DB5 had a powerful 4.0 litre engine and a five speed gearbox which lifted it above its older relative.
The DB5 could reach speeds of up to 148mph with the straight six engine which produced 282bhp. Bond had a fast car, but his version had extra's including machine guns, bullet-proof screen, tyre slashers, front and rear rams, radar and phone, smoke screen, revolving number plates and best of all, a passenger ejector seat.
The James Bond films gave Aston Martin great press and a cool image due to aspirations of a nation of alpha males wanting to be like James Bond. The great image forged for Aston Martin still lives on to this day and I am sure the Bond connection proved to be a massive influence.
Even though the DB5 is probably the most famous of Aston Martins, the car only lived for 2 years in production with just over 1000 cars built before being replaced by the DB6. If you can grab one of these then you will have a real collectors item - just be careful with the switches though, you could send your wife through the roof.
Richard McCombe writes interesting articles about used cars for a popular automotive website. If you want to see good used aston martin car deals go to autoweb.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Richard_McCombe
0 comments:
Post a Comment