Aston Martin V12 Vantage S Roadster - WHEEL SPIN IN 3rd GEAR !!!

**Aston Martin V12 Vantage S Roadster Review: A Full Dive into Power, Performance, and Elegance**

---

### Introduction: A Dream Come True

Hey guys and welcome to Petrol Ped! Today, I have an absolute treat for you. parked on the driveway is a car that has been on my wish list for years—an Aston Martin V12 Vantage S Roadster. It’s mine for the day, and I thought you might like to take a look at it. We’re going to do a full review, inside and out, so let’s get going.

---

### The Car in Question: A Brief Overview

The V12 Vantage S is a classic two-seater, rear-wheel-drive Roadster and the smallest car in the Aston Martin range. However, despite its compact size, it packs a massive punch. Fitted with a huge 6-liter V12 engine, this Roadster can reach 60 mph in just 3.9 seconds and tops out at an impressive 201 mph. The stopping power is immense, thanks to the standard-fit carbon ceramic brakes.

Under the hood lies a 5.9-liter V12 engine that produces 565 BHP and 457 lb-ft of torque. This powerhouse is coupled to a SportShift 3 gearbox, offering a sporty driving experience. But before we get into the nitty-gritty, let’s take a closer look at what makes this car special.

---

### A Badge of Honor: The Aston Martin Story

You might not know this, but every Aston Martin has a unique journey to wear those iconic wings on its bonnet. The final badge you see on any Aston Martin is the "Final Inspection" badge. This badge is placed on the car only after it passes a rigorous 33-point check. For this particular V12 Vantage S, the final inspection was conducted by Mick Freeman.

The wing badges themselves are quite fascinating. They’re handmade in Birmingham’s jewelry quarter and take three Ford Focuses to roll off the production line before one badge is completed. This attention to detail is just another reason why Aston Martins are so special.

---

### Interior Elegance: A Work of Art

Inside this Roadster, you’ll find a true work of art. The piano black center console has been reworked for a cleaner layout, and the carbon-backed Sports seats provide excellent comfort and support. The lined soft top can be dropped at the touch of a button, allowing you to enjoy the glorious soundtrack of that V12 engine.

The car’s design is stunning, whether the hood is up or down. It’s no wonder I’m already saving pennies because this V12 Vantage S starts at £47,000 on the road—before any optional extras. This particular example is very nicely spec’d with a lot of carbon fiber, including the front splitter, rear diffuser, and Bonnet Louver.

---

### Starting Up: The Sound of Power

Here we have the emotional control unit—and yes, it’s as dramatic as it sounds! To start this car, you simply insert the key into the slot and turn. But let’s be honest, I might just start it in the barn because the sound alone is worth hearing. It’s the sound of the Gods, a noise that commands attention.

---

### Taking to the Road: A Driver’s Perspective

Now, here we are, sitting in this beautiful Aston Martin V12 Vantage S Roadster. With the roof down and the engine roaring, I’m pinching myself to make sure this is real. This car is a beast, with 565 horsepower pushing it from the rear wheels. The road is still greasy today, so I have to be extra careful.

The first thing I do is switch to Sport mode. The note of the engine changes immediately, and even without altering my throttle position, I feel more power and engagement. The difference between Normal mode and Sport mode is night and day, and honestly, there’s no reason not to drive it in Sport mode all the time.

---

### Gearbox Insights: SportShift 3

This car comes with the SportShift 3 gearbox, which is essentially a flappy paddle manual gearbox. However, I strongly advise against driving it in D (Drive) mode. It’s jerky and not smooth at all. The key to enjoying this car is to switch to manual mode and use the paddles.

If you try to drive this car like you would a Porsche PDK or Audi S-tronic, you’ll be disappointed. Instead, treat it like a manual car. As you lift off the throttle slightly when changing gears, the car shifts up smoothly, making you feel connected to the machine. It’s not just about speed—it’s about engagement.

---

### Handling and Performance: A Driver’s Joy

The V12 Vantage S is rear-wheel-drive, which means it requires careful handling. The traction control is excellent, but this car demands your full attention. Applying too much throttle in the wrong place could lead to a spin, especially on a greasy road like today.

Despite the challenges, this car is a joy to drive. It handles beautifully through bends, and the carbon ceramic brakes are nothing short of impressive. The power delivery is smooth, and the noise from that V12 engine is absolutely glorious. This is what driving a naturally aspirated V12 Roadster is all about.

---

### Comparison with Competitors: A Class Apart

To put this car into perspective, I’ll compare it with some of the other high-performance cars I’ve driven this year: the F-Type SVR, 991 Turbo S, and R8 V10 Plus. All three are in the 550 horsepower range but come with four-wheel drive. This V12 Vantage S, on the other hand, is a pure rear-wheeler.

While four-wheel drive offers safety and traction, there’s something special about driving a car that demands your full attention. It’s a man’s car, offering a sense of accomplishment every time you get it right.

---

### Final Thoughts: A Special Car

As I continue to drive this V12 Vantage S, I realize how lucky I am to have this opportunity. The more I drive it, the more confident I feel in its capabilities. It’s an intimidating car, but one that’s hugely rewarding to drive through bends. The steering is beautifully weighted, and the carbon ceramic brakes are excellent.

But for me, the highlight has to be that V12 engine. There’s something truly special about driving a naturally aspirated V12 Roadster. It’s a sound, a feeling, and an experience that you just can’t replicate with modern turbocharged engines.

---

### Conclusion: A Farewell and Thanks

In conclusion, this Aston Martin V12 Vantage S Roadster is absolutely spectacular. From its stunning design to its powerful engine and engaging driving dynamics, it’s a car that leaves a lasting impression. I’m already looking forward to the possibility of driving another Aston Martin in the near future—hopefully sooner rather than later.

Thank you to the team at Aston Martin Chichester, particularly James and Drew, for giving me this opportunity. It’s truly appreciated.

---

If you enjoyed this video, don’t forget to give it a thumbs up, leave a comment below, and subscribe for more content like this. Until next time, keep those pedals to the metal, but remember—drive safe!

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enhey guys and welcome to petrol ped so today I have a very very cool car parked on the driveway um I'm going to get to drive my first Aston this is an Aston Martin V12 Vantage s Roadster it's mine for the day and I thought you might like to take a look at it so we're going to do a full review of this inside and out so let's get going the V12 Vantage s is a classic two- seat rear wheeel drive Roadster and is the smallest car in the Aston Martin range but when fitted with the huge 6 L V12 it can reach 60 mph in 3 .9 seconds and tops out at a staggering 2011 mph huge stopping power comes from the standard fit carbon ceramic brakes this car has a stunning spec with carbon fiber diffuser front splitter and radiator surround and the carbon Bonnet Louver is telling the tale that a V12 lur beneath the 5.9 l V12 produces 565 BHP and 457b feet of torque and is coupled to a s-speed sport shift 3 gearbox now then the thing you might not know about ased Martin I everybody knows that the Aston Martin logo is a is a pair of wings but no Aston Martin can wear those Wings until it's past final inspection so the very first badge that gets put on any Aston Martin is actually this one so you lift the Bonnet of any Aston Martin you'll see the final inspection badge this was finally inspected by Mick Freeman so once it's passed out it's a 33 Point check to get this badge once he's got that badge it's allowed to wear the wings including the famous one on the Bonnet now and and these are quite interesting as well so these are made in the jewelry quarter in Birmingham uh and the interesting stat is that these are handmade um in the time it makes Aston Martin to to make one of these badges uh three Ford focuses have rolled off the production line I just think that's fantastic the interior is a work of art piano black center console has been reworked to make a cleaner layout a very special place to be the carbon backed Sports seats provide excellent comfort and support the lined soft top drops at the touch of a button and at speeds of up to 30 mph allowing you to enjoy the Glorious soundtrack from the stunning V12 one of motoring's great pleasures the Vantage Roadster looks stunning Hood up or Hood down okay as usual while I have this car I shall be performing a number of very important tests and just like I did with the ftype svr I've got to start with the this car look good in my garage test I'm afraid it does and I think it probably looks even better than the F type this this goes very very well I need to start saving even more pennies because um this uh the V12 antigs starts at £47,000 on the road and I guess that's before you start ticking any of the options and they have some fantastic things that you can do you can kind of tailor and bespoke the car to your own taste uh and work with uh Aston Martin to do that um so yeah and this car's very very nicely speced there's a huge amount of carbon fiber on this car the Bonnet Lou all the front splitter the rear diffuser um very very nice I think we need to get it out on the road see what it can do okay so here we have the emotional control unit and to start this car you basically put that into this slot push it and and you just got to love this we might just have to start it in the barn cuz I think it's going to sound pretty good in here oh yeah that is the sound of the Gods now we need to take it out for a drive I think it's that way so here we are guys in an Aston Martin V12 Vantage s Roadster and I am pinching myself to believe this is happening today I had to go with the roof down I don't know how whether you're going to be able to hear me okay I'm just fingers crossed that you will um so now there's a number of things I want to do in this test um I guess the first thing is take you on the Journey of driving such a beautiful beautiful car um but I also want to try and Pitch this car against some of the other cars I've driven this year this is a a very very high performance car for me it's the you know my probably my favorite Aston I think I love the Vantage anyway uh and then when they decided to drop a V12 in it you just think well this is going to be the perfect combination so so let's kind of talk through a few things about this car so couple of things about this test drive firstly the road's still quite greasy today so um I am massively wary about this car you know it's got 565 horsepower all through the rear wheels although it's got some it's got some beautiful um you know stability controls and all that kind of stuff um I'm still gonna have to be very very careful so the first thing I'm going to do with this car is put it into sport mode there's a button on the dashboard and the note of the engine changes straight away and even without changing my position on the throttle I get more pull and and more kind of go and it just sounds Mega oh my goodness me the difference in this car car between driving in normal mode and in sport mode is like night and day and I have to say I can't understand why you wouldn't just drive it in sport mode all the time it just sounds amazing so that's number one let's just drive it in sport mode for the whole day yeah yeah we'll we'll definitely do that the next thing is this car is fitted with the sport shift 3 uh gearbox it's a flappy paddle uh manual gearbox basically although it does have a drive option you can just press D on the dashboard and drive it in in D you really don't want to do that it just doesn't drive well in that and and I have to kind of talk through this because I find this the most interesting thing about the car is in lots of I kind of did my my research before driving this car and read some reviews and watched some videos and so on and this gearbox gets a bit of a hard wrap and this interesting thing is this year I've driven quite a few of the Porsche pdk equipped gearbox cars and also the Audi satronic and those are double double clutch um super super smooth um and probably the best at what they do now if you drive this car in the same way you would drive a car with a pdk or stronic you're going to be disappointed because that's not how to drive this car this gearbox the way to do it is first you stick it in manual and you drive it on on the paddles that's you've got to drive this car on the paddles don't drive it in D it's very jerky when it changes gear but the trick is on the downshift you can downshift are great it's the upshift you you've got to imagine that you are changing gear I like that another ASD just gone the other way very nice early Vanquish you you have to imagine you're driving a manual car so just as you were doing a manual car and you dip the clutch to change gear you probably just lift off the throttle a little bit if you do that in this car so as you engage the higher gear so you pull on the upshift if you just lift the throttle and it's not a huge amount just almost like just take the pressure off it the car changes gear beely smoothly and you carry on and it's a really smooth shift and what I love about that is you feel engaged with the car you know some of these more Modern Gear boxes you kind of they're just so perfect you just put your foot flat on the ground and you accelerate now bang bang bang up the gearbox and they're great but I like this because it kind of makes you feel part of the car there's only one thing for it guys petrol P Hill Climb Time it's quite greasy so I'm just going to take it careful but the noise bouncing off the trees just sticks in ah sadly beaten on the petrop pet Hill Climb by a r of 45 tragic but we've climbed up into the clouds tell you what this thing lights the rear tires up quite easily actually oh yes so right now I just want to buy the guy a drink the guy at Aston Martin who apparently said when they bought out the V8 Vantage he just looked at it and went I get a V12 in that and they went that' be ridiculous you can't he went yeah I can so anyway he just kept going on about it and apparently they gave him a V12 and and he shoehorned it in I don't know how cuz if you look under the Bonnet how on Earth they get a 6 L V12 in a car of this size I got no idea idea but hats off to you mate it's just it's created an absolute monster the the noise of this thing to to drive a naturally aspirated V12 to seek Roadster just a dream come true and and the the sad reflection of the times you know I can't see there being many more of these out you know the sort of V12 naturally aspirated engine is sadly a Dying Breed we're going down the smaller v6s turbocharged hybrid type cars but this is only my second V12 if you've seen my Rolls-Royce Wraith video I mentioned about that being the first V12 I driven but that was just so refined and so quiet it kind of didn't wasn't disappointing but it this thing my goodness me the noise it makes me just into fourth down into third down into second and just just a bit squir me then he just got so much go what I'm out here driving I just need to take a moment to say a massive thank you to the guys at Aston Martin Chichester uh James uh in particular for kind of offering me the opportunity to have this car for the day I'm just so grateful and so appreciative for your support uh and then Drew for looking after me this morning handing the car over and making sure everything was okay um they valed it beautifully um and really really looked after me so thank you very very much um and I'm really hoping that this is the last Aston Martin on petrol ped we're kind of having a bit of a chat about getting something very special um in the new year I guess all I need to say is um they're quite busy with it at the moment as a demonstrator cuz it's not been around very long uh and it has a V12 engine um that's all I'm going to say but hopefully early in the new year uh we'll get my hands on on another Aston Martin but thank you very much guys um I really do appreciate uh the support that you're giving my channel in allowing me to have access to such beautiful cars so it's probably worth just talking about trying to compare this with a couple of the other cars are driven this year of the same kind of power so as I said this is 565 horsepower so the ftype svr um and the 9911 Turbo S and the R8 V10 plus they're all this kind of super 550 Brake Plus horsepower but all three of those have four-wheel drive and and this doesn't this is just rear wheeel drive uh yes it's got some great traction control but man do you have to be on your game with this car it's it's quite intimidating obviously it's not my car and I have to give it back in one piece but you really do have to kind of think about what you're doing think about when you're going to Appo you know apply some throttle because um this car bite your ass if you're not careful um but I quite like that it's a man's car it's really you know those the kind of four-wheel drive and I know I keep going about how much I love four-wheel drive but I do like that because you you know you can because it gives you that kind of safety you you can put the power down you're not going to have to kind of worry about the back end getting loose in this you do um I'm certainly not going to take it to the point where I start doing that on a public Road in a car that's not mine on a greasy Road surface but I do get the feeling that when when that happens I'd imagine it's quite kind of manageable to a point but you've got to be careful with this car you put your foot down too hard in the wrong place and you're going to end up going to the scene of the nearest accident here we go bit of o Road it just does have such a lovely feeling that noise of that engine's just ace oh yes whoa this is a rocket ship this thing it just surges power my goodness me it just builds speed so quickly down into fourth oh and then on the power oh yes this is the kind of road where it just starts to make a bit of sense let's coming to the trees there a bit more damp just be a bit more careful of the traction oh what A noise oh those brakes are really good really very good yeah this is a quick car very very quick see you get this sport shift gearbox you get the hang of it and it's fantastic I honestly don't don't know where people I mean you just can't compare it to pdk and asonic they are different things you just feel so engaged when you get a shift right just makes you feel like a like you're really kind of in at one with a car love it straight bit of Road not to 60 gently here we go wow this thing squirms Mano that was only 3/4 throttle I've not got are not brave enough to really nail it but man does this thing get off the line quickly sounds great too so guys my final impressions of this car are going to be very long lasting basically this thing's absolutely spectacular The more I've got to drive it today the more confident I've got in the car it's very intimidating it's massively powerful you have to be on it but when you feel that confidence it's a hugely rewarding car to drive through the bends beautiful feel beautiful weighted steering carbon ceramic brakes are very very good the power deliver is beautiful but the highight for me has got to be that V12 you know to drive a naturally aspirated V12 is very very special and this sport shift gearbox I love it actually I I like it it connects me to the car it just sounds brilliant as well so all in all a very very very special car um out of all the cars I've driven so far this year for me it's the one that's made me feel so so special it's fantastic so anyway um I got the car for the rest of the day so I'm going to continue driving round roof down um I've actually got a Vanquish in front of me which is quite cool um but yeah I hope you've enjoyed the video uh if you have done so give me a thumbs up comment below are always welcome and if you haven't done so already please subscribe to petrol ped 4 plenty more content to come and hopefully more cars just like this one but I'll leave you with the spectacular sound of this thing oh why couldn't you just love that absolutely lovely so you take care guys drive safe a\n"