1978 Aston Martin V8 Series III

Aston Martin's customers had been clamouring for an eight-cylinder car for years, so Aston Martin designed a larger two-door saloon for V8 applications. The engine was not ready, however, so in 1967, the company released the DBS with the straight-six Vantage engine from the DB6. Two years later, Tadek Marek's V8 was ready, and Aston released the DBS V8. With the demise of the straight-six Vantage in 1973, the DBS V8, now restyled and called simply the Aston Martin V8, became the company's mainstream car for nearly two decades. It took a well-earned retirement in favour of the Virage in 1989.

This example, chassis #11973, is an original UK right-hand drive automatic, built on 23rd June 1978. Supplied by H.W.Motors Ltd of Walton-On-Thames to its first owner and finished in Imperial Burgundy with a Fawn leather interior. This car has the VIN suffix ending RCAS, indicating that it is one of the last Series III V8s produced and features four twin-choke, downdraught Weber carburettors replaceing the Bosch fuel injection system.

The history file shows that a Mr Philpott of Clapham took ownership of the car on 2nd September 1986. There are numerous invoices from specialists such as Rikki Cann and Pugsley & Lewis addressed to Mr Philpott for work carried out, the last of which is dated 21st May 2003. After some years in storage, our vendor acquired chassis #11973 in 2012 and immediately put the car through a successful MoT test. Since this point, the car has once more remained inactive, with our vendor commenting that as he parked it up again, he noticed that the oil pressure was low, and he made the decision that the time had come to restore this big Aston and return it to rude health.

Chassis #11973 wears registration 'AMV 88T' and is supplied with a UK V5c and a host of old MoTs and invoices. Offered as a matching numbers, but non-running project, this Aston Martin is the perfect candidate for a full restoration.