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Aston Martin DB9 Gallery
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| RELIABILITY AND QUALITY RATING: |
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A class act - mostlyThe DB9's air of quality is sensational. There are no visible mass-produced parts from cheaper cars in the cabin - door handles, switchgear and the like - and the machined-aluminium instruments are a work of art. The leather is soft and fits snugly and evenly, the wood has a satin finish designed to age gracefully, and no surfaces try to be materials they are not. Everything has a meaty precision about the way it moves. Outside, the paint is glassy, the panel gaps are even (an impressive feat for a car with composite bonnet, front wings and bootlid) except for a small inconsistency at the bootlid's rearmost corners, and underneath the chassis is built with tidy precision.
Aston Martin makes much of its cars' new-found reliability, but the launch cars had a few glitches - low fuel pressure causing a catalyst-protecting automatic engine stoppage in one (on a motorway), instrumentation and display maladies in another, and some wind noise around the trailing edge of the side windows. Cures for all are apparently in hand, so we shall give Aston Martin the benefit of the doubt.
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