Motoring News
Today, 11 August 2016Aston Martin DB5: the original road test - Throwback Thursday
Back in 1964 the Aston Martin DB5 was up against the Jaguar E-Type and Maserati 3500 GTI
The Aston Martin DB5 is a car that once defined a brand. It was the chariot of choice for Mr Bond himself, and the resulting exposure meant this single model helped to shoot Aston Martin into the global limelight.
It was also remarkably good at being a luxury grand tourer, if an Autocar road test from 1964 is anything to go by.
“More and more cars today can reach the magical ‘ton’, but those that can do it with the ease and rapidity of the Aston can be counted on the fingers of one hand,” is the explanation in the near 52-year-old issue.
“It is a car that defies definition, for it can put on so many widely differing characters that it always seems tailored to one’s mood of the moment,” the article continues. “Pottering home through a city’s evening exodus, whittling through strings of weekend tourists, or gobbling up great strings of concrete motorway like an Italian with a plate of spaghetti, the Aston makes all of these light work and comes to the end asking for more.”
Priced at £4248 including tax, the DB5 wasn’t far off the value of a semi-detached house. But the Autocar road test team remained convinced that the price was justified, especially after subjecting the DB5 to some high-speed testing on track.
“During several fast laps of a closed test circuit we tried to find the limit of adhesion. Initially the car under-steered, but as we got faster and put the power o
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Henry Ford, the clever man that he was, saw an opportunity to cash in on farmers’ habit of modifying the simple and rugged Model T automobiles they used for working on their fields, and thus the ‘pickup’ was born.
For nearly a century, the pick-up truck has been used to combine everyday transportation with commercial activities. Here in Blighty, the American idol remains about as popular as country music, but perhaps not for much longer.
You see, the government still classes pick-ups as light commercial vehicles, provided they have a payload of more than one tonne, which means you pay a flat tax rate irrespective of the CO2 output. There are even competitive rates on fuel allowances and the first year’s VED is £130 less than it would be if it were classified a normal car.
For the 2016-2017 tax year, BIK is set at £3170. So if you pay tax at 20%, that’s £634 a year, or £52.83 a month; for a 40% tax payer, it works out at £1268 for the year, or £105.66 a month. Electric cars aside, then, a pick-up is most likely the cheapest company car you can own — especially compared with a conventional SUV.
With this in mind, manufacturers have been getting more savvy, offering SUV levels of interior quality and the modern-day amenities tha
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