Aston Martin Valhalla

[Morteza]

A lot has changed on this car since they unveiled the concept. It no longer looks like a baby Valkyrie, no longer a limited edition to 500, no longer costs $1,300,000 (around $800,000 now), no longer has a V6 turbo...
It's got the 4.0-liter twin-turbo V-8 from AMG GT Black Series. It will be supplemented by two electric motors, one powering the front axle and the other blending assistance with the combustion engine at the rear through the transmission. Together Aston says these can add up to 200 horsepower, making for a peak combined output of 937 horsepower. The company is promising a 2.5-second zero-to-62-mph time and a 217-mph (around 349 kph) top speed and says the car is on track to deliver a 6:30 lap time of the 12.9-mile Nürburgring Nordschleife. (The current production-car record there is the 6:43.3 recently set by the Porsche 911 GT2 RS.) The target dry weight is 1550kg.

















Here's how the concept looked like

[Singabule]

AM cut the downforce level compared to the concept car, I guess something to do with "Not so RB but AM" IP.

[basti313]

AM cut the downforce level compared to the concept car, I guess something to do with "Not so RB but AM" IP.

I rather think they had to cut the active aero for complexity in design (endless CFD for different angles and combinations), complexity in control (endless programming and safety) and complexity in manufacturing. They did a massive cost cut, so I do not think they can do this under active aero.
Without the active aero the downforce needs to be traded for the catalog value of top speed.

[Holm86]

Definitly still a good looking car, but the concept looked better, and more interesting.

Most of the cost cut has come from not having to develop an entirely new V6 engine, and just borrow one from the new AMG partnership.

[Just_a_fan]

AM cut the downforce level compared to the concept car, I guess something to do with "Not so RB but AM" IP.

The thing about downforce is that it's all very cool on a road car - "my car makes 600kg of downforce at 150mph" - but it's actually not that useful:

It adds drag (bad in the modern world because drag means more fuel is used)

it adds weight because stuff needs to be stronger (bad because that requires more fuel to accelerate it)

it's dangerous because a car that's relying on downforce for cornering ability will crash if that downforce diminishes (very bad). Lose some downforce mid-corner on a real world road and no one is going to prevent the ensuing accident - not even a top racing driver will have the room to collect it all up and sort it out when there are ditches and hedges and walls next to the road.

Sure, hardly any of these things will be driven very much, but companies need to appear to be making an effort to be socially acceptable.

[Cold Fussion]

What makes this worth 700k other than because it can be. A heavy supercar with a production AMG engine without the interesting design of the concept.

[Sevach]

AM cut the downforce level compared to the concept car, I guess something to do with "Not so RB but AM" IP.

The thing about downforce is that it's all very cool on a road car - "my car makes 600kg of downforce at 150mph" - but it's actually not that useful:

It adds drag (bad in the modern world because drag means more fuel is used)

it adds weight because stuff needs to be stronger (bad because that requires more fuel to accelerate it)

it's dangerous because a car that's relying on downforce for cornering ability will crash if that downforce diminishes (very bad). Lose some downforce mid-corner on a real world road and no one is going to prevent the ensuing accident - not even a top racing driver will have the room to collect it all up and sort it out when there are ditches and hedges and walls next to the road.

Sure, hardly any of these things will be driven very much, but companies need to appear to be making an effort to be socially acceptable.

It's useful if you want to chase those lap time records lol.

[Andres125sx]

I love the side view

[Just_a_fan]

AM cut the downforce level compared to the concept car, I guess something to do with "Not so RB but AM" IP.

[...]

It's useful if you want to chase those lap time records lol.

It's a problem where the marketing mob put a lap time at the Nordschleife above real world enjoyment.

[variante]

Compared to the concept, every detail that they could ruin, they ruined.
The front looks like a dumb fish.
But it somehow manages to remain a fairly good looking car from certain angles.

Performance wise, it should be in the same league as the SF90, while costing twice as much. Hmmm...

[Just_a_fan]

Performance wise, it should be in the same league as the SF90, while costing twice as much. Hmmm...

For the people that buy these cars, that's not going to be an issue. They'll probably have several such cars and it'll be down to badge etc., as to whether it's one of their personal "I must have that" cars.

[variante]

Performance wise, it should be in the same league as the SF90, while costing twice as much. Hmmm...

For the people that buy these cars, that's not going to be an issue. They'll probably have several such cars and it'll be down to badge etc., as to whether it's one of their personal "I must have that" cars.

That's surely true, for some customers. But most of the time it is not, or they wouldn't have dropped the Valhalla's price from 1.3M to 800k$.

Plus, it's not such a special car anymore (no Newey's aero and similar), so i fail to see why this should be more desirable than a Ferrari to the average multi-millionaire.

[Just_a_fan]

Performance wise, it should be in the same league as the SF90, while costing twice as much. Hmmm...

For the people that buy these cars, that's not going to be an issue. They'll probably have several such cars and it'll be down to badge etc., as to whether it's one of their personal "I must have that" cars.

That's surely true, for some customers. But most of the time it is not, or they wouldn't have dropped the Valhalla's price from 1.3M to 800k$.

Plus, it's not such a special car anymore (no Newey's aero and similar), so i fail to see why this should be more desirable than a Ferrari to the average multi-millionaire.

The Valhalla was always going to be a different car to the Newey aero special. Newey's ideas are obviously in the car - the general aero design is similar to the Valkyrie after all. But the extreme nature of the car has been toned down a bit. It's still a moulded tub/seat with the feet above the hips in the way of a racing car, for example. No Ferrari has that. It's a different beast to a Ferrari. Ultimately, the performance of all of these cars is so close that you'd need to be a professional driver in a closed environment to be able to separate them. Rich blokes who buy them are never going to get close enough to the edges of the envelope to understand. And it they do, they'll likely end up in the hedge.

The price drop is because they've gone for a buy-in PU as much as anything else.

Desirability isn't just about price, it's a whole load of personal emotional responses to a design etc. Some people wouldn't touch a Ferrari, for example, in preference to a similarly priced other marque. Why? Perhaps they just don't like Ferraris. And some will buy stuff from lots of manufacturers purely because they can. "Look, I've got one of those new Aston Martins!". They then sell them on after 6 months and move on to the next new thing. That's just the way it is.

[Morteza]

[gruntguru]

Nailed it - especially the side view. Forward to 16:14 to see before and after.