Luxury Cars

The 4 door Aston Martin Rapide has had one of the longest gestation periods of any car in recent memory. It first came upon the scene almost four years after its concept debuted at the 2006 Detroit Auto Show. The initial reaction of everyone who saw it was a simple “Build it now!!!”

The Rapide will be completed with Aston Martin’s hand built 6.0-liter V12 engine that puts out 477HP at 6,000 rpm and 443 lbft of peak torque at 5000 rpm.

All that power and torque goes to the tarmac via rear wheels through Aston’s six-speed ‘Touchtronic 2? automatic transmission. Although a slush-box it does allow the driver to change gears automatically or manually via the steering column-mounted paddles made of magnesium. There’s no performance stats yet, but the word from Frankfurt is that 0-100km/h should happen in a little over 5,0 seconds. The Aston Martin Rapide features what the company terms four ’swan wing’ doors that open slightly upwards. Read more…