CarBrandLogos archive · Aston Martin · 1963

Aston MartinDB5

Superleggera bodywork, a four-litre six, and a lifetime contract with James Bond.

Photo: DeFacto · CC BY-SA 4.0

The story

A defining chapter in Aston Martin history.

Explore the ideas, engineering and context that shaped the Aston Martin DB5, then continue into its specifications and place in the marque's lineage.

Origins

Aston Martin did not set out to build a film star. What arrived in 1963 was a careful revision of the DB4 it replaced, using the same Superleggera construction licensed from Carrozzeria Touring of Milan: hand-formed aluminium panels draped over a frame of small-diameter steel tubes, wrapped around Federico Formenti's body, now with faired-in headlamps under perspex cowls.

AMDB5VC · User Wholived on en.wikipedia · CC BY-SA 3.0

Design and engineering

Underneath sat Tadek Marek's twin-cam straight-six, opened out to 3,995 cc, driving the rear wheels through a five-speed ZF gearbox that was new to the car. A three-speed BorgWarner automatic was available for owners who wanted the effortless version. This was a grand tourer in the strict sense of the term: two proper seats and a pair of occasional ones, a long bonnet, and the ability to cross a country quickly without any fuss about it.

Aston Martin DB5 engine · Herranderssvensson · CC BY-SA 3.0

In production

Then came Goldfinger. Ian Fleming's novels had put Bond in an earlier Aston, but the 1964 film gave him the silver car with the ejector seat, the revolving number plates and the wheel-mounted blades, and it returned in Thunderball the following year. That single piece of casting fixed the shape in the public imagination for the next sixty years and did more for the marque than any amount of advertising a small British company could have afforded.

Aston Martin DB5 Vantage · Ed Callow · CC BY 2.0

Legacy

Only 1,059 were built in three years, among them 123 convertibles and thirteen shooting brakes, the estate conversion having been commissioned so that the company's owner David Brown could carry dogs and guns. The DB6 replaced it in 1965 with a longer wheelbase and a cut-off Kamm tail, a better car in most measurable respects and a far less famous one. In 2020 Aston Martin returned to Newport Pagnell to build twenty-five continuation cars, complete with working gadgets and no road registration, which tells you which version of the DB5 the world actually wants.

At a glance

The facts that define it.

Produced

1963–1965

Units built

1,059

Engine

DOHC Straight-6, 3995 cc

Body

2-door 2+2 coupé

Technical specification

The DB5, in detail.

Production: 1963–1965 (1,059 units); 2020 (25 units)
Class: Grand tourer
Body style: 2-door 2+2 coupé; 2-door convertible (123); 2-door shooting brake (13)
Layout: Front-engine, rear-wheel-drive
Engine: DOHC Straight-6, 3995 cc
Transmission: 5-speed ZF box or optional BorgWarner 3-speed automatic
Designer: Federico Formenti at Carrozzeria Touring Superleggera
Assembly: United Kingdom: Newport Pagnell, England
Manufacturer: Aston Martin