Aston Martin repair and service in Orlando

Aston Martin sits in an unusual place among the marques we handle. The structure under the bodywork is bonded and riveted aluminium rather than a welded steel shell, and the engine bay across the modern range has held Jaguar-derived V8s, Aston's own V12s and Mercedes-AMG turbo V8s at the same time. What the badge on the bonnet says tells you much less about the work than which car it is bolted to.

Corsa Automotive is Orlando's Aston Martin mechanic, with factory-trained specialists providing expert service. Our Aston Martin mechanics are factory-trained and certified to work on all Aston Martin models.

The structure is bonded aluminium, not a welded shell

From the DB9 onward Aston Martin built its cars on a bonded aluminium architecture: extruded and pressed aluminium sections joined with structural adhesive and mechanical fasteners rather than spot welds. The DB11, the current Vantage and the DBX carry the same principle forward on a newer platform.

That single fact changes structural repair completely. Heat is the enemy of both the adhesive and the temper of the aluminium around it, so a section that would be cut and welded on a steel car has to be handled by the method the structure was built with. Sectioning points are not a matter of judgement on a bonded car, and the difference between a repair that restores the structure and one that merely looks right is invisible once the trim goes back on.

It also means measurement matters before anything is decided. A bonded structure that has been loaded does not always show it in the panel gaps, and the only honest way to know what moved is to measure it rather than to look at it.

Which engine is in the car decides most of the job

The V8 Vantage ran a 4.3 litre and later a 4.7 litre V8 with its roots in the Jaguar AJ-V8. The DB9, DBS, Virage, Rapide and Vanquish ran Aston's naturally aspirated 5.9 litre V12. Both are of an era, and both are now old enough that condition rather than mileage is what tells you where a car stands.

The modern cars are a different proposition. The DB11 V8, the current Vantage and the DBX use the Mercedes-AMG 4.0 litre twin-turbo V8, which means the engine, much of its management and a good deal of the diagnostic approach come from Affalterbach rather than Gaydon. A shop that knows AMG V8s already knows most of what that engine wants. The in-house 5.2 litre twin-turbo V12 in the DB11 AMR and the DBS Superleggera is Aston's own and behaves like it.

This is why a generic booking for "an Aston" is close to meaningless. A 4.7 Vantage and a DBX share a badge and almost nothing else under the skin.

Rear transaxle, and the Sportshift question

The front-mid engine cars place the gearbox at the rear axle as a transaxle, which is what gives them their balance and what makes some jobs longer than the same job on a conventional layout. Work that would be gearbox-out on another car reaches the length of the torque tube here.

The automated single-clutch gearboxes fitted to the V8 Vantage and the DBS under the Sportshift name are the item owners ask about most, and fairly. It is an automated manual rather than a dual-clutch, so it has one clutch doing the work of one clutch, and clutch life is a genuine service consideration rather than a fault. Wear and adjustment are worth checking on any car of that era being considered for purchase, because the answer changes what the car is worth.

The electronics follow the era, not the badge

Cars built during Aston's time under Ford share electrical architecture and components with the wider group, so a fault on a DB9 often reads like a fault on something rather more ordinary once you have the right tool on it. The modern cars run Mercedes electrical architecture instead.

The practical consequence for an owner is that diagnosis is about knowing which lineage a given car belongs to and reaching for the right approach, rather than plugging in a generic scanner and reading whatever it decides to say.

Aluminium bodywork and what refinishing it involves

The panels are largely aluminium, with composite used in places across the range. Neither behaves like steel. Aluminium moves differently under heat, needs its own tooling kept separate from anything used on steel, and has to be isolated from steel fasteners and fixings so the two metals do not sit in contact and corrode.

Refinishing follows from that. Preparation, primer choice and the way a repair is blended are all decided by the substrate, and getting Aston's deeper metallic and pearl finishes to match across an aluminium panel is a colour matching problem before it is a spraying problem.

Models we work on

Grand tourers

DB9, DB11, DBS, DBS Superleggera, Vanquish, Virage

Sports cars

V8 Vantage, V12 Vantage, current Vantage

Four door and SUV

Rapide, Rapide S, DBX, DBX707

What we do on these cars

• •Diagnostics and electrical fault finding across both the Ford-era and Mercedes-era architectures
• •Scheduled maintenance, fluids, brakes and suspension
• •V8 and V12 engine service, including the Mercedes-AMG twin-turbo V8
• •Transaxle and clutch work, including Sportshift inspection and adjustment
• •Collision and structural repair on bonded aluminium, with measurement before a repair plan is set
• •Aluminium panel repair, refinishing and colour matching
• •Pre-purchase inspection, which on these cars is worth more than on most
• •Wheels, tires and alignment

Questions we get asked