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Aston-Martin factory tour video from sometime between early to mid 90s

Didn't notice any presses so from the looks of it, they hand shape all the body panels . If this is correct, no wonder they went belly-up . AML was large enough of a manufacturer that I would have expected them to stamp the body panels.

Aston Martin Factory tour Building the Virage - YouTube

Aston Martin Lagonda Factory Newport Pagnell 1994 - YouTube


They have been bankrupt and saved many times and are still in production. They just did a deal with Mercedes AMG to provide engines, electrical components and related engineering services.
 
It must take the patience of Job to be a panel beater. There appeared to be several damaged panels about. Imagine putting all that time and skill into a piece and some animal ruins it.
 
Didn't notice any presses so from the looks of it, they hand shape all the body panels . If this is correct, no wonder they went belly-up . AML was large enough of a manufacturer that I would have expected them to stamp the body panels.

Aston Martin Factory tour Building the Virage - YouTube

Aston Martin Lagonda Factory Newport Pagnell 1994 - YouTube

Volume wouldnt justify tooling costs especially back then before china , korea and taiwan made our press tools
Secondly the whole point of a aston back then was the fact its coachbuilt

A proper skilled double curve sheet metal worker ie no bondo makes a machinist look semi skilled
 
Volume wouldnt justify tooling costs especially back then before china , korea and taiwan made our press tools
Secondly the whole point of a aston back then was the fact its coachbuilt

A proper skilled double curve sheet metal worker ie no bondo makes a machinist look semi skilled

A good one makes it look easy. I worked at a vintage car shop in '92. The panel beater there was a magician, The stuff he made from scratch was amazing, the stuff he saved was out of this world. When he was done with a AC Cobra or Aston Martin body you could prep it for paint with less than a pint of filler.
 
Didn't notice any presses so from the looks of it, they hand shape all the body panels . If this is correct, no wonder they went belly-up . AML was large enough of a manufacturer that I would have expected them to stamp the body panels.

I'm sure their cars being stereotypical British garbage quality didn't help them make money.
 
I'm sure their cars being stereotypical British garbage quality didn't help them make money.

They were ok cars for the time...except for the electrics.
Lucas...Prince of Darkness.

Remember that every car prior to about 1980 was a complete POS...excepting a few lucky coincidences and the F-150.
 
They were ok cars for the time...except for the electrics.
Lucas...Prince of Darkness

One more clueless comment. Italian "electrics" make Lucas look like state of the art. Aston Martins can be a bit strange, but for a low volume hand built car they are not bad. I have worked on lots of them and they are far better than most low production cars.
 
At about 4:20 in the first video the camera pans across a rack of panels. You can see the rear panel with license recess and tail light areas. It appears to be an untrimmed stamped part. Note the slight wrinkling of the excess untrimmed material as the panel was drawn through the blankholder.

They are chased over a buck
 
One more clueless comment. Italian "electrics" make Lucas look like state of the art. Aston Martins can be a bit strange, but for a low volume hand built car they are not bad. I have worked on lots of them and they are far better than most low production cars.

Italian is bad too.
Ever deal with a SPICA fuel injection system?
All mechanical, when it works it works fantastic.
 
Lucas mechanical...never heard of it.

Even the Bosch on the later ALFAs was pretty crap electrical.

Well then you have a significant gap in your knowledge of automotive history. Ferrari, Jaguar, Lotus, Maserati, Can-Am, B.R.M., Repco-Brabham, Cosworth, Chevrolet etc etc.

One of the first (if not the first) in a volume production car - Triumph TR5 etc.

LeMans, F1 winners etc etc.

They were not as sophisticated as modern fuel injection, but then nothing was at the time and for a long time afterwards - we are talking about 1956 onwards.

Please - fewer cheap cracks at Lucas. Their high volume automotive electrical components were about average for the time and better than typical French or Italian parts. I can't comment on US made auto electrics because they were exceedingly rare here. I would guess that the typical UK garage found them a bit strange, just the same way that US garages found SU carburettors difficult to understand. Lucas had many divisions including aerospace. They made some rather advanced missiles amongst other things.
 
Well then you have a significant gap in your knowledge of automotive history. Ferrari, Jaguar, Lotus, Maserati, Can-Am, B.R.M., Repco-Brabham, Cosworth, Chevrolet etc etc.

One of the first (if not the first) in a volume production car - Triumph TR5 etc.

LeMans, F1 winners etc etc.

They were not as sophisticated as modern fuel injection, but then nothing was at the time and for a long time afterwards - we are talking about 1956 onwards.

Please - fewer cheap cracks at Lucas. Their high volume automotive electrical components were about average for the time and better than typical French or Italian parts. I can't comment on US made auto electrics because they were exceedingly rare here. I would guess that the typical UK garage found them a bit strange, just the same way that US garages found SU carburettors difficult to understand. Lucas had many divisions including aerospace. They made some rather advanced missiles amongst other things.

Over here it's
Hilborn Fuel Injection | The FIRST name in Fuel Injection
then the Corvette...1956, the first production car to put out one horse per ci.
Used Rochester mechanical FI.

And Lucas electrics are legendarily bad.
So bad it's become a joke.
http://www3.telus.net/bc_triumph_registry/smoke.htm
 
Hilborn were certainly early, but they were constant flow injection as I recall - i.e. a pump just squirted fuel out of nozzles constantly. The Lucas system was more like aircraft engine practice - i.e. one injector per cylinder, individually metered and timed.
 
Over here it's
Hilborn Fuel Injection | The FIRST name in Fuel Injection
then the Corvette...1956, the first production car to put out one horse per ci.
Used Rochester mechanical FI.

And Lucas electrics are legendarily bad.
So bad it's become a joke.
http://www3.telus.net/bc_triumph_registry/smoke.htm

The Hilborn stuff is still used on sprint cars, 410 ci normally aspirated, a good one will make 980-1000 HP. Hilborn injection is constant flow, fuel regulation is by a barrel valve which allows more or less fuel to bypass and return to the tank after passing through the pill or dial a jet, whichever you are using. Constant flow works fine for methanol fuel that these cars use. If you look down an injection stack on the Dyno it looks like a fire hose is in there. Pre electronic IndyCars used it also. About 2 MPG with a 2.65 L Cosworth is all you could get for mileage. We ran Lucas McKay injection on a small block chevrolet in a March chassis to win the 1984 IMSA GTP championship.
 








 
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