# Shine On: 1993 Aston Martin V8 Vantage V550



## Paul-T (Nov 2, 2006)

This detail is an excellent example of my Enhancement Detail, where a huge improvement is made to the vehicle's condition and appearance, without stretching to a Correction Detail.










What we have here is a proper Bristish muscle car, and fortunately for me, yet another opportunity to work on an all time personal favourite. For those that are interested, here is a bit of background information.

This incarnation of the Vantage was produced in small numbers, just 239 in total between 1993 and 1998. 199 of them were like this, known as the V550, it boasts a twin supercharged 5.4 litre V8 producing a simple epic 550bhp and matching 550 lb/ft of torque! The last 40 made were V600's, adding a further 50bhp to the engine's output. The noise from the fairly small looking twin exhaust pipes is staggering, a rich, booming burble so distinctive to high performance V8 engines. Back in the day, it was the fastest road car Aston Martin had ever produced, they claimed 176mph top speed, but independent tests at the time achieved in excess of 200mph, still a real Supercar benchmark today.

Sitting in the car it's obviously no stripped out track warrior. The interior is extremely plush and comfortable, expensive hide and walnut covering everywhere you look, perfect stitching wherever panels meet. This particular car is even rarer for it's automatic gearbox, not that it blunts the performance!

Outside the car, two things are immediately striking. Firstly are the unusual headlights, each containing three separate lenses. A really anorak point of note is that these are square, which points to originality. Later cars had round lenses, and availability of the original square units is basically zero, so if any early car has receives any damage, it would have to be rebuilt using round lights. The other thing you can't help but notice are the positively massive brakes! The front discs are 362mm in diameter, the largest ever fitted to a road car when this was new, and gripped by chunky looking 4 piston Brembo calipers. Good job too, this car weighs 1990kg so takes some stopping when it's on a charge!

Finally, the price. Brand new in 1993, this car cost an eye watering £190,667 so it remained the choice of he well heeled connossieur. There is no doubt that modern Aston Martin's are some of the most beautiful cars ever made, but for me, you just can't beat the presence and atmosphere created by this muscle bound monster.

On with the detail. As mentioned, it was booked for a one day Enhancement to get it clean and try and restore some life back to the very flat looking paintwork. this car spent some time abroad in a very hot and humid climate, and I think that is quite telling in the paintwork.























































As always, I started by giving the car a good pre-soak, followed by a careful wash using lambswool mitts. Whilst kept under cover, it does live in London and gets heavily contaminated in the urban environment. After washing, the contaminants on the paint were dealt with using a clay bar, the paint changing from exceptionally rough to silky smooth as the dirt was pulled from it's pores.

Once dry, I used a halogen lamp to inspect the paintwork and found the reason for the dull appearance, it was in terrible condition!



















With a limited amount of time available in the one day, and a lot of paintwork to cover, I carefully chose a polish that would allow me to make a significant improvement to the paint's appearance, without having to follow up with further time consuming passes to refine any polishing marks. I actually settled on a blend of Menz 106 with a touch of 3.02. I taped up section of the bonnet to make an assesment, and the difference can clearly be seen below.




























While the deeper scratches still remain, you can clearly see the massive difference made - the paint once again looks properly green, the colour deep and rich with a good gloss compared to the wing and unpolished bonnet section. Happy with this, I continued around the car in the same way.



















Taken without a direct light source, below you can see the huge enhancement in the paint's appearance.



















The driver's door looked terrible in the light, replicating what it would look like outside on a sunny day. Once polished, whilst not perfectly defect free, the paint now reflects the light cleanly and the beautiful colour is clearly visible.



















To reach my deadline I had to really push hard. Once the polishing was finished, I went back around the car applying Swissvax Cleaner Fluid to each panel to prepare it for wax, and once completed the wax chosen was Best of Show, known for the fabulous wet look it imparts.

Wheels were treated with Autobahn wheel wax, tyres with Pneu. The stainless steel exhaust pipes were polished, and the glass cleaned. Inside, the carpets were vacuumed and the acres of leather cleaned then conditioned.

Now finished, I actually ended up with a few minutes spare whilst I waited for the owner's assistant to meet me and inspect the car.


















































































In the place I was working were some gorgeous cars, various Bentley's, a brace of Ferrari's (430, 599 and 612), etc, but this perfect example of an early 70's Rolls Royce Corniche Coupe caught my eye, it was spotless!










I'm glad to say the owner's assistant (and subsequently the owner) were delighted with the result, a full correction detail is likely to be booked in later in the year.

Thanks for reading, hope it's not too much of a ramble!


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## dw0510 (Oct 22, 2006)

Very nice lovely classic AM.


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## Saqib200 (May 13, 2008)

Great work mate. love the twin-supercharged motor! 

Which pad and polisher did you use with the 106/3.02 mix?


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## Paul-T (Nov 2, 2006)

Chigago Pneumatic rotary with a Megs polishing pad.


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## Clark @ PB (Mar 1, 2006)

Nice work Paul, what a car! :driver:


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## drive 'n' shine (Apr 22, 2006)

Old Skool Sledgehammer


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## ads2k (Jul 12, 2006)

Great Job Paul :thumb:

Old skool Aston - lovely , had a ride round Donnington in one years ago, fantastic noise, wasn't slow either :lol:


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## Deanoecosse (Mar 15, 2007)

nice work Reggie, great improvement to the finish. Did the owner fire it up? I bet that would sound incredible in the underground carpark


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## Perfection Detailing (Nov 3, 2007)

Very nice Paul and what a great car to work on...


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## Roy (Jan 17, 2007)

Nice work Paul :thumb:


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## Bigpikle (May 21, 2007)

serious british muscle 

thats a big difference for 1 day on such a big monster :thumb:


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## Piratez (Jun 28, 2008)

Hhhhhmmmmmmmmmm.....beautiful car Paul....great experience detailing this car.....


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## branter33 (Aug 23, 2007)

Nice work on a gorgeous looking car.. Would love to see one of these in the flesh. 

You really cant beat a classic Aston for sheer class. :thumb:


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## CopperBottom (Nov 17, 2007)

God i love the 90s vantages. Always has been and always will be in my dream garage


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## North east Car Care (Jan 14, 2008)

Cracking work Paul


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## Christian6984 (Dec 20, 2007)

nice work, a huge improvement


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## Rowan83 (Aug 21, 2007)

Wow! fantastic job mate. I bet that was really tough!

Don't see many of them about :thumb:


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## Superhands (Jan 7, 2009)

Very nice, great work as always


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## KleenChris (Apr 4, 2008)

Excellent work :thumb:


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## Paul-T (Nov 2, 2006)

Deanoecosse said:


> nice work Reggie, great improvement to the finish. Did the owner fire it up? I bet that would sound incredible in the underground carpark


I had to move it about a couple of times, the owner's assistant just chucked me the keys in the morning and left me to it for the day! It sounded amazing, had a worse turning circle than an oil tanker and was a tricky bugger to manouver thanks to it being rather keen to take off, even on creep!

This is owned by the same chap who has the Gallardo Spider I did before Christmas, with the concrete contamination on it.


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## Miglior (Feb 12, 2006)

great job. i remeber a kid at schools' dad had one of these, what a beast!!


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## The Cueball (Feb 8, 2007)

CopperBottom said:


> God i love the 90s vantages. Always has been and always will be in my dream garage


I'll second that... I will have one of those one day!!!!!!!

:argie:


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## RandomlySet (Jul 10, 2007)

nice job there!

I love Astons, however, not sure on the looks of this one ???


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## remonrace (Jan 13, 2009)

Great work


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## chris l (Mar 5, 2007)

Nice work


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## Nick_S (Dec 20, 2008)

Mother of god twin superchargers?! I bet that car is a riot to drive. Fantastic turn around on the paint condition and what a perfect color for the car as well.


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## Auto Detox (Dec 22, 2007)

Now that's a _CAR!_ Gorgeous, nice job Paul

Baz


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## MickCTR (Mar 4, 2006)

Awesome, always loved these. Look really menacing! I've said it before but who said the Americans did muscle cars when the Brits can make that! :thumb: Love it!


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## ahaydock (Jan 4, 2007)

Great work.


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## SuperchargedLlama (Apr 25, 2008)

thats my most favouritist aston ever


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## Yoghurtman (Dec 9, 2008)

Love the triple headlights each side, it sure looked better after your transformation...


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## Brisa (Aug 9, 2006)

Beautiful car and a nice turnaround in a day!


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## jamest (Apr 8, 2008)

Great job, one of my favourite Aston's. Saw one on the road a couple of months ago, but it had round lights, but a stunning sight and sound.


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## WHIZZER (Oct 25, 2005)

Shine On said:


> In the place I was working were some gorgeous cars, various Bentley's, a brace of Ferrari's (430, 599 and 612), etc, but this perfect example of an early 70's Rolls Royce Corniche Coupe caught my eye, it was spotless!
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Paul thats the same as our family one excpet ours is Silver with red leather


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## Envy Car Care (Aug 17, 2006)

Very nice Paul, very nice indeed.


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## glyn waxmaster (Dec 20, 2006)

Nice work as ever Paul.


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## karburn (Feb 1, 2008)

An elegant monster. Great work on restoring it's inner beauty!!!


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## HMANS3 (Aug 9, 2007)

My dream car would be a V600 Le Mans


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## Paul-T (Nov 2, 2006)

Awesome.


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## jamest (Apr 8, 2008)

HMANS3 said:


> My dream car would be a V600 Le Mans


Unfortunately there were only 60 or so made werent there? I'm sure there probably aren't that many in the country anymore.


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## Paul-T (Nov 2, 2006)

Just 40 of the 600bhp examples were made, out of a total of 239 of that body style.


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## ALANSHR (Jun 29, 2007)

Very nice indeed, a great job on a true classic, nice bit of history as well


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## Breeze_Blue (Aug 20, 2006)

What a great and a defent improvement on it's original state, a true AM classic.


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## Conlon (Aug 13, 2008)

that looks cool!


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## Nissan SE-R's (Jan 1, 2009)

WOW... congrats. Beautiful work on a similar car.


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## chunky79 (Nov 25, 2007)

That car has the best engine/ exhaust note EVER. You have done a great job on a truely beautiful motor.

Dunc


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## pcc (Oct 11, 2006)

Fantastic looking car, must have been great to work on. Looks great now nice work.


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