2022 Aston Martin DBX707 Prototype Drive: The New SUV King?
"Watch this." Aston Martin boss Tobias Moers keeps his foot hard on the brake, selects launch control, and pushes the gas pedal to the floor. The revs build with a guttural snarl, then he sidesteps the brake pedal. The Aston Martin DBX707 super-SUV lunges with a roar like a hungry lion, the nine-speed transmission snapping through the upshifts as the twin-turbo V-8 kisses the 7,000-rpm redline. Moers laughs out loud. "It's ridiculous fast," he says.
A tight left-hander. Moers pitches the Aston into the turn and punches the throttle. The tail swings wide, and he catches the motion with an armful of opposite lock. He keeps his foot down, and the Aston exits the turn in a graceful drift, as comfortable and composed as a sports car. Moers grins. "You shouldn't be able to do this in an SUV," he says, shaking his head.
It's good to see the boss enjoying his new toy.
And the Aston Martin DBX707 is very much Moers' toy. His fingerprints are all over Aston's new super-SUV, from the tweaked, AMG-sourced 4.0-liter twin-turbo under the hood, to the AMG Speedshift MCT wet-clutch nine-speed automatic with its Sport+ mode and launch control function, to the chassis that's been tuned to deliver precision and support without compromising ride comfort.
The DBX707's mission statement is simple: to be faster than a Lamborghini Urus and to handle better than a Porsche Cayenne Turbo Coupe. And after a brief drive of a production-ready prototype at Aston's compact Stowe Complex test track at Silverstone, England, we're tempted to say, "Mission accomplished."
The DBX707's raw thrust is a given: With 697 hp and 664 lb-ft of torque under the hood, even a 5,000-plus-pound SUV is going to feel quick. This Aston builds speed with relentless intensity, the power delivery so smooth and linear, you must carefully watch you don't hit the rev limiter if you're shifting manually. Moers claims a 0-60-mph acceleration time of less than 3.5 seconds and a top speed of 193 mph, and the DBX707 feels every bit that quick.
But what's much more impressive than how the DBX707 goes is how it handles. It feels agile and responsive, not twitchy or straining at its tethers, especially when changing direction rapidly. It has, quite simply, the best, most authoritative front end of any super-SUV in the business, precise in its response and concise in its feedback. Turn in, and the Aston goes exactly where you point it. More important, there's plenty of support from the rear axle, right through from corner entry to exit.
Much of that, Moers says, is the result of a major rework of the front suspension, particularly in terms of its supporting structures. A cross-brace means the front shock top mounts are 55 percent stiffer than those of the standard DBX. A 0.16-inch-thick underbody panel has raised torsional stiffness by 1.3 percent to improve steering response and impact control. Compression and rebound damping have been increased by 20 and 10 percent.
Modifications at the rear include a new e-diff with a higher locking rate, and spring and damper rates that are softer than those at the front. Overall, the electronic active roll system has been recalibrated to deliver 50 percent more torque on low body motions, and the roll control is now more rear-biased at higher cornering speeds to reduce understeer.
As a result, the DBX707 feels remarkably light on its feet, with none of the slightly leaden, nose-heavy feel you get when pushing a Lamborghini Urus or a non-GT Porsche Cayenne Turbo Coupe—the car Moers' team initially used as a dynamic benchmark—and little of the exaggerated roll and head toss you normally feel in vehicles with a high center of gravity. And although it's tighter and tauter than a regular DBX, the ride is still impressively refined, with no harshness or jitters over small, sharp lumps and bumps.
It still feels more like a grand tourer than a track rat.
The Aston Martin DBX707 is hella fast in a straight line and jaw-droppingly good through the twisty bits. We'll reserve final judgment until we get to spend more time with it on real-world roads a few weeks from now, as well as until such time we can pitch it against its rivals in a proper comparison test. On first impression, though, the DBX707 just might be the new benchmark super-SUV.
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In honor of Independence Day, we're bringing back this 2015 story on the greatest American cars of all time. Did your favorite make the list?America may not have invented the automobile. That honor goes to German engineer Karl Benz and his Patent Motorwagen of 1886. But America quickly made the automobile its own. By 1904 the United States led the world in automobile sales and production, and by 1913 80 percent of all the cars made in the world were made right here. American automakers — there were 253 of them active in 1908 alone — were pioneering new technologies and new vehicles at an astonishing rate.So as we celebrate the Fourth of July, why not celebrate the 10 greatest American cars of all time? You can define greatness is many ways, but these are all automobiles that were hugely influential in terms of their technology, design, engineering, and their impact on society and popular culture. 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With their twin-cam, four valves per cylinder, supercharged straight-eight engines, Duesenberg SJs were said to be capable of 104 mph in second gear and 140 mph in top; in 1934 a lightweight roadster averaged 135 mph for 24 hours on the Bonneville Salt Flats. Just 36 SJs were built between 1932 and 1935. Gary Cooper and Clark Gable owned the only two short-wheelbase SSJ Duesenbergs ever built.Jeep MB"The Jeep, the Dakota airplane, and the landing craft were the three tools that won the war," claimed Dwight D. Eisenhower, Allied Supreme Commander during World War II. More than 700,000 Jeeps had been built by the war's end, giving Allied troops overwhelming superiority of movement on the ground. Post-war, the tough, nimble, go-anywhere Jeep enjoyed a second, more peaceful career as a recreational vehicle, establishing the nexus between capability, style, and functionality that still underpins 21st-century car buyers' love affair with crossover vehicles. The Jeep is the car that saved democracy. And it was the seminal SUV.Oldsmobile "Rocket" 88Rock 'n' roll began with a song about a car: Elvis Presley was still driving a gravel truck when 19-year-old Ike Turner walked into a tiny studio owned by Sam Phillips in Memphis in 1951 and recorded "Rocket 88," a paean to the fastest American sedan you could buy at the time, the Oldsmobile 88 powered by the 135-hp Rocket V-8 engine. Launched in 1949, the Rocket-powered 88 was America's first muscle car, proving almost unbeatable in stock car racing through 1951. The record "Rocket 88" was an unexpected hit, and the royalties enabled Phillips to start Sun Records, the label that gave musicians such as B.B. King, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, and, of course, Elvis their starts.Chevrolet Corvette Making its debut in 1953, the Corvette is 10 years older than Porsche's 911, and every bit as iconic. 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When Ford's Lee Iacocca realized the first wave of baby boomers were coming of driving age, and that they would want to drive something very different from the big, soft land yachts their parents loved, product planner Hal Sperlich proposed wrapping mundane Falcon mechanicals in sporty sheetmetal. The Mustang proved an overnight sensation, with more than 1 million sold in the first 18 months of production. But performance that truly matched the style wasn't really unlocked until the Shelby GT350 appeared in 1965, establishing the formula that has kept the Mustang alive for more than 50 years.Ford GTHenry Ford II thought he had a deal. Nine months of negotiation were over, and on July 4, 1963, he was planning to be in Maranello, Italy, signing a $10 million deal with Enzo Ferrari that would give Ford Motor Company a half share in the storied Italian sports car maker. A Ferrari-Ford sports car was already being planned, with an Italian V-12 engine in an American chassis. But the deal never happened—Enzo Ferrari pulled out at the last minute. An enraged Henry then authorized the development of the Ford GT40, with the express goal of humiliating Enzo's blood-red racers in the Le Mans 24 Hour race. Which it did, convincingly, in 1966. The icon inspired two generations of successors, including the latest Ford GT powered by a twin-turbocharged V-6.Plymouth Voyager, Chrysler Town & Country, and Dodge CaravanOthers had toyed with the concept, notably VW's Microbus of the '60s and Lancia's 1978 Megagamma, but it was Lee Iacocca and Hal Sperlich—the same team who'd made the Mustang happen at Ford 20 years earlier—who at Chrysler in 1983 revealed the perfect combination of size, seating, and drivability that came to define a new segment-busting family vehicle, the minivan. Within a decade almost every mainstream automaker offered a minivan in the U.S., making traditional station wagons obsolete. The segment has declined in recent years, but the basic formula established by Chrysler remains the definitive one: front drive, sliding side doors, and a highly flexible seating package for seven or eight passengers.Tesla Model SThe mere fact the Tesla Model S exists at all is a testament to innovation and entrepreneurship, the very qualities that made the American automobile industry the largest, richest, and most powerful in the world. We've not yet become a nation of bankers or burger-flippers. America can still make things. Great things. But what marks the Tesla Model S as one of the all-time great American cars is that it has single-handedly changed the tenor of the conversation about electric vehicles. The Model S made electric cars cool for auto enthusiasts. How? It's good-looking and quick. Very, very quick. In Plaid guise, we clocked the Model S at just 2.07 seconds to 60 mph. That's monumentally impressive—the quickest production vehicle we've ever tested, and an American-made EV at that.
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