2009 Aston Martin V8 Vantage

Aston Martin, freshly free of Ford Motor Company, is trying to become the next Porsche, a small, low-volume, high-profit sports car company, just as Porsche becomes the next European powerhouse buying up huge chunks of Volkswagen AG.

Take the V8 Vantage, Aston's competitor for the 911. Please. Because if you have a lot of money and a bit of taste, the Vantage is worth consideration as an alternative to the Best Sports Car Ever. You can see this Porsche strategy in the 2009 V8 Vantage, a beautiful two-seat coupe and roadster that's quickly becoming an iconic luxury sports car design. Like Porsche with the 911, Aston won't be updating the Vantage with facelifts every few years. The '09 V8 Vantage looks exactly like the '08 V8 Vantage, save for new 19-in. wheel designs and some interior tweaks.

The big change is under the hood. Aston Martin has bored and stroked the 4.3L V-8 (saying it has, in essence, designed a new block) to 4.7 L. Now it has 420 hp, up 11 percent, and 347 lb-ft of torque, up 15 percent. The new V-8 has thinner cylinder liners, a new forged-steel crankshaft with new holes in the counter-weights for reduced rotating mass and better inter-bay breathing, new forged-steel connecting rods and cast-aluminum pistons, a new sump casting for the dry-sump lube system and oil pickup points moved to the sides of the pump, from the front and rear. The cylinder heads have a new intake port and bigger inlet valves, increased 1 mm to 35. Aston has modified the intake manifold to match the new port to optimize airflow. The engine still comes from Ford's Cologne, Germany, factory.

In the Vantage, the new V-8 is quick and fast. Does it feel 40 hp more than a 4.3L Vantage? Yes, marginally, though this is really the sort of thing that shows up better in instrument testing. Punch the throttle in second, or especially third gear on short Eiffel Mountain straights between tight turns, and it feels like you've got all the power you need. So did the old 4.3 -- this is just more immediate, thanks to that higher torque figure. The V-8 still sounds docile around town, rorty under throttle.

Aston Martin also worked on the transmissions, modifying the clutch and flywheel, reducing clutch pedal efforts for the standard six-speed manual and saving 1.1 lb (for reduced rotating masses and thus better engine responsiveness) with either the manual or the six-speed Sportshift twin-clutch automanual. Engineers remapped the Sportshift, but it still feels too slow (with no driver-operated programming system). The only way to drive it smoothly is to lift while shifting, which really defeats the paddle-shifter's purpose. The full manual feels nearly perfect, both shifter and clutch, but the shifter sits tall on the center console, which causes a driver to elbow himself while shifting gears.

Aston has upgraded the suspension, too, including stiffer springs and standard Bilstein dampers. Apparently responding to some criticism that the V8 Vantage was too soft, Aston has added an optional Sports Pack, which includes forged lightweight alloy wheels (the five-spoke design is nice; there's also a new 20-spoke design), uprated springs, and on the coupe a revised rear anti-roll bar.