[Closed] thoughts???

I think it's a car
A hairdresser's car

Was going to say that you need a cheaper hairdresser, but looking at that travesty I think you need one with better eyesight!

;o)

It's like the reverse of Porsche...
Porsche = stretched beatle
Cygnet = squashed aston
shame they didn't go all the way and make a scrap cube, at least it could have been called art.

Haredresses car lame dude taht suks wikid

will Bond be using it?

Moneypenny would not be seen dead in it.

Travis - Member
will Bond be using it?

Bond never drove Aston Martins. He was a Bentley man.

it's an over priced Toyota IQ

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Please tell me it's not true? That's horiffic.

Best way to undermine your brand: If your brand is purely high performance, beautiful looking exotic supercars, build a generic city eco car. Idiots.

I think Aston Martin should be commended for this.

Anyone who can make an iQ look even uglier must be pretty special.

EDIT And if they can get people to part with their money for it, they're genii.

build a generic city eco car

nope!

[b]Re-badge a generic city eco car[/b]
worked well for Rover with the TaTa-CityRover

well done Aston 🙄

will Bond be using it?

as a skip 🙂

Looks like one of those little Toyotas that I've seen on a dolly behind a motorhome. I thought it was perfect for that. Is this just a way to spend a lot more money than necessary?

People want manufacturers to produce green cars. They've answered the call.

Thing is they could give one away free with every normal aston so that you can save the shopping trips for the iQ - brilliant idea.

Bond never drove Aston Martins. He was a Bentley man

the most famous car was an Aston
[img] [/img]

So you have to shell out £50k on top of already owning a 'proper' Aston to buy one, suppose people will, eejits!!

Junkyard, that's where you're wrong!

Bond drove one a '33 Convertible, 4.5l with an Amherst-Villiers blower on the front. He also had a MkVI and a later MkII Continental, also blown, but by Arnott this time.

The films were another thing altogether.

coffeeking - Member
People want manufacturers to produce green cars. They've answered the call.

People don't want - or expect - supercar brands to build (or rebadge) pap like that. Ford, as Aston's parent company, have plenty of brands within their portfolio to satisfy the need for economical small cars.

From a branding perspective, the very thought of putting an Aston Martin badge on anything less than a stunning looking high performance sports car is suicide. It's the very reason that the big motor corporations market their cars within distinct brands.

Would Ferrari do it? No.

also blown

and there I was thinking that was the passenger's job...

That aint no Cygnet, it's an ugly duckling.

Bond never drove Aston Martins. He was a Bentley man.

He was also supposed to look like Hoagey Carmichael, smoke 60 a day and have a violent temper.

But let's not let that get in the way of a good film franchise eh?

Bond never drove Aston Martins. He was a Bentley man.

He was also supposed to look like Hoagey Carmichael, smoke 60 a day and have a violent temper.

But let's not let that get in the way of a good film franchise eh?

Pook, I'd rather not let a film franchise get in the way of some great books! 😉

I've seen a whole lot worse! I almost like it 😳

Hmmm, maybe on a second look......

Is it really just a Toyota iQ?

Nice idea tho in theory - luxury small cars.

Did they need to get their average MPG down for some piece of legislation?

People don't want - or expect - supercar brands to build (or rebadge) pap like that.

I'm not sure that's really the case, the people who like supercars to be supercars are starting to die out (I'm one of them). The general public would now, I suspect, happily accept that a supercar company would produce something a little more down to earth/useful (and would probably gobble it up if the price was lower, jsut for the sake of owning a name!) and as an individual entity I suspect Aston are under some pressure to make efforts to move towards greenery, despite being under the umbrella of Ford.

Would Ferrari do it? No.

Almost, just produced a half-assed hybrid IIRC. If they were not even remotely considering greenery and emissions they wouldn't have even considered going near a hybrid idea unless it improved performance, which is didn't.

[img] [/img]

Fiat500, merc A class and a smart car in a 3 car collision.

The guys in the aston factory will have to wear masks when they leave if they handbuild that.

a good article on the theory and legal pipeline behind emissions controls in the car industry

http://www.csmauto.com/news/csminsights/2009/02/European+CO2+Emissions+Legislation

Aren't Lambourghini developing a diesel for the same reasons?

Hybrids can improve performance if they are built that way CK 🙂

Oh dear!

looks like a DBS got crushed between two lorries, utterly hideous and complete rubbish. Most of those who buy this sort of car are graduates (because they can't afford anything else that isn't a rust-bucket) or those really annoying militant eco-jobbies who slash the tyres (using a fairtrade knife of course) of anyone who has an engine of more than 1.3 🙄 . It's not going to work for either because of the price tag for the former, and association with petrol-headed-Polar-bear-murdering racers for the latter.

...now to clear the chunder off my keyborad 😳

(just to make it clear I do want to go green, but I think the best way is through hydrogen rather than hybrids or shoeboxes on wheels, as new greener methods of electricity generation will result in the hydrogen itself becoming even greener, which is a much better solution. Hydrogen also fits better into society as we simply carry on as normal once the infrastructure is in place, it's just the actual fuel we pump into our cars is different)

My first reaction was one of absolute disbelief, followed closely by disgust then despair, then f".;*@ b@8s:r'd moronic ****t management, anger 😈

This line in the generic management marketing bullshit babble really made my p$ss boil

a natural partner for Aston Martin's line-up of acclaimed luxury sports cars.

NO IT ISN'T 👿

..............and breathe...............

I would love to se the reaction of Mr Clarkson when he claps eyes on it. I should imagine several Paddington bears will be getting their stuffing kicked out!

LOL you'll all be saying Cayennes were **** next.

FFS what do you think ays for all those yummy Caymens?

Ugly Duckling more like.
But cars need to be smaller, so welcome to the future.

coffeeking - Member
The general public would now, I suspect, happily accept that a supercar company would produce something a little more down to earth/useful (and would probably gobble it up if the price was lower, jsut for the sake of owning a name!)

Er... Isn't that just another way of saying "cheapen the brand"? The whole essence of the Aston Martin brand is a lack of accessibility - the pinnacle of achievement, taste, wealth and driver ability (perceived).

Ford are developing plenty of eco vehicles and have plenty of brands already ideally positioned to introduce/develop eco city vehicles. To stick an Aston Martin badge on that concept is utter folley.

Yes, supercar brands have developed diesels, electic hybrid and fuel cell prototypes, but they've all be about proving that the technology can be used in performance vehicles, ergo, it will be plenty good enough for more workaday cars.

When a brand as well developed as Aston Martin do something like this, it's a very sad day for the motor industry.

Oh, and people who like supercars are not dying out: People's tastes, goals, aspirations might shift as they get older (which I suspect is what happened with yurself) but there will always be people who covet the acme of motoring excellence.

hydrogen rather than hybrids

Uh oh.

Hydrogen also fits better into society as we simply carry on as normal once the infrastructure is in place

Hahahahahah!

Someone doesn't quite get it....

Oh and a hybrid is a way of making your fuel go further in an internal combustion engine. So it's not an alternative to hydrogen, rather a complimentary technology in any car, including hyrdogen ones.

Er... Isn't that just another way of saying "cheapen the brand"? The whole essence of the Aston Martin brand is a lack of accessibility - the pinnacle of achievement, taste, wealth and driver ability (perceived).

Not necessarily, you can have all of those things without a screaming V8. Maybe they think they achieved that. Maybe they're not selling enough high-end cars and need a smaller car to bring in the bread (ford won't support a loss-making group, especially in this climate). Don't underestimate the buying power of the name-followers.

Yes, supercar brands have developed diesels, electic hybrid and fuel cell prototypes, but they've all be about proving that the technology can be used in performance vehicles, ergo, it will be plenty good enough for more workaday cars.

It's still the same thing in essence, they're simply saying "we can put everything we normally put into a supercar into a smaller lighter vehicle".

Oh, and people who like supercars are not dying out: People's tastes, goals, aspirations might shift as they get older (which I suspect is what happened with yurself) but there will always be people who covet the acme of motoring excellence.

You missed my point, I do like supercars for the sake of supercars, I'm very much a car lover. But I suspect that the number of people who are willing to buy one and covet the "pure" nature of it is reducing and being replaced by those who just want to drive in something with the brand but really would like an economical car that's green and isn't embarrassingly loud and a target for the green brigade (be they the authorities, people in the streets etc). Cars are fast becoming just modes of transport to the majority, engineering excellence appears to have much less of a draw these days.

From chatting to successive waves of engineering students it's becoming clearer to me that, at this level at least, people no longer seem to have dreams of owning or creating something of engineering excellence and raw power, most don't have the passion I saw in the majority of my fellow eng students when I was undergrad, they just use it as a way to bring in the beans in sufficient quantities to get wasted at the weekend.

as new greener methods of electricity generation will result in the hydrogen itself becoming even greener, which is a much better solution.

We'd need to step up the green electrickery production somewhat to replace all the transport power with the highly inefficient cracking of water to get hydrogen. We are barely able to produce a fraction of the uk's current elec usage with its currently available renewable capability, even if we scale up and use every possible renewable resource we may jsut be able to cover our own growing elec needs. And you want to throw all of our transport fuel needs into the mix too? You'd best get working on the technology then!

The point is that people won't pay a massive premium for a car like that - not in sufficient numbers to make it viable as a profit maker. There simply isn't the 'value added' in sticking an AM badge on something that is no better than the competition, and the margin for improvement in that sector is miniscule - nowhere near akin to the differences between a family hatchback and a V12 supercar.

What makes a car succesful in the super mini or eco city car class is completely different. The most successful are cheap, quirky, fun and funky. They appeal to younger buyers and buyers who aspire to be young. That car doesn't do that and will never succeed. The Aston brand is too diometrically opposed to the values that guarantee success in that sector.

CK, you are suggesting that only a super can be the epitome of engineering excellence. I disagree. They may however be the ultimate application of engineering to create power.

The amount of engineering and innovation going into say a modern diesel is quite remarkable really especially when you consider you can buy it all for what, £12k. It's even more sophisticated in the US where they have NOx traps as well as DPFs. The VW white paper from the late 70s about diesels makes fascinating reading. They seem to have tasked their engineers with making workable diesel car engines, and following their development over the last 30 years is a great engineering story I think.

The Prius is also an amazing engineering feat. There's so much innovation in that car that I really think it represents an engineering triumph.

The Aston Martin Cygnet Concept is a bold step towards a new form of transportation; the luxury commuter car, a form of personal transportation that sees the company's core values engage with a new environment

LOL, what a load of pish.

back to this topic, has anyone seen the page on this car in the latest topgear magazine?

got to be a wind up?

It's a bit like a Smart Car and A class.

It's for folk that want a 'Badge' but don't have or want to spend the money.

The A1 looks nice though 🙂

[IMG] [/IMG]