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Paul Gover8 Jul 2019
NEWS

Sports car DNA for Aston Martin DBX

Landmark British SUV will be a true Aston Martin – says Aston Martin

Key figures in the development of the Aston Martin DBX are promising it will set new dynamic and visual standards for a sporty SUV.

The DBX program is the biggest in Aston’s history, with a budget of more than $1 billion and a workforce of more than 350 engineers and design specialists over the past four years.

Final DBX prototypes made their first public demonstration runs in camouflage colours at the Goodwood Festival of Speed on the weekend as chief engineer Matt Becker and creative boss Marek Reichman revealed exclusive details of their work to carsales.com.au.

“It’s the biggest and the most important program that Aston has ever done -- and also the most challenging. We have never done an SUV before,” said Becker.

“The two unique selling propositions are to be the best looking SUV on the road and the best SUV dynamically on the road. I think Marek has done his job. And we’re on target as well.”

Reichman emphasised that the DBX is a true Aston Martin and not just another big, boxy SUV for family hauling work.

“DBX is a real Aston because it uses all the same principles to design the car, but just has a different user packager,” he said.

“What’s the start word? It's sports. We make sports cars.

“We can do it because it’s our platform. I’m not constrained by having a grandfather or hand-me-down platform.”

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His swipe at rivals at the top end of the SUV category, including the heavyweights from the Volkswagen Group -- Bentley Bentayga, Lamborghini Urus and Porsche Cayenne -- comes as Becker confirms the Cayenne Turbo as the performance target for the DBX.

“The one we focussed heavily on is the Cayenne Turbo, and we want to be above that,” he said.

“We’ve gone for something that is dynamically better than a Cayenne, sounds better than a Cayenne. We need to make the car drive like it looks.

“We also had a BMW X6 M which we used for some handling targets.”

Becker has been on the job with the DBX after arriving from Lotus and says Aston started from basic principles with the SUV program.

“We took a bunch of SUVs to the Nurburging, but we didn’t just drive them around the track. We drove them at 300km/h on the autobahn and across a field, and on public roads.

“The thing that shocked me was the range of capabilities of these cars. We took the learning from that and looked to translate the way the DB11 drives, and translate that to an SUV.”

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Becker, like Reichman, says Aston had a mechanical advantage during development.

“Because we have all our individual components, we can tune the car to the way we want it to be. So being Aston Martin is an advantage.

“There are many systems on the car that allow us to tune the dynamics of the vehicle. The systems underneath are different to a sports car [but] I won’t go into the details.”

Reichman is slightly more open, but still reluctant to give details when the launch of the DBX is so close.

“All you're doing is using the principals of the GT cars and translating them to having three [people] in the back. The utility is the amount of use you can get.

“It’s not utilitarian, but it allows you to have … not lifestyle but you can do more things with the car. You can take it over mountains.

“It’s not an average sedan. An SUV has a specific use. You’re allowing yourself to have more of the feeling of the DNA of Aston Martin.”

Neither Reichman nor Becker would reveal which models which will follow the DBX, although the engineer did indicate others will follow.

“Obviously it’s a new platform and you’re not going to stop at where we’re at. We’re not going to stop…” said Becker.

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Written byPaul Gover
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