2018 Aston Martin DB11 V8 vs. 2018 Lexus LC 500
On this episode of Head 2 Head presented by Tire Rack
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MotorTranscript
00:00 Hi there! You are looking at the Aston Martin DB11.
00:04 It's that rare combination of beauty and power and elegance.
00:08 In my opinion, it's one of the very best GT cars on earth.
00:13 The trouble is, it didn't fare so well at this year's Best Driver's Car.
00:17 In fact, it lost to a Lexus.
00:19 Yeah, but this isn't just any Lexus.
00:22 This is the LC500, and this head-to-head, it's already settled.
00:26 What is that Aston even doing here?
00:30 Yeah, but this isn't the big, heavy V12 DB11.
00:34 No, this is the DB11 V8.
00:38 And it features a hand-built, twin-turbo, 4-litre V8 from AMG.
00:43 Has the game changed? There's only one way to find out.
00:47 [ENGINES REVVING]
00:49 [LAUGHS]
00:55 [ENGINES REVVING]
00:57 [TIRES SCREECHING]
00:59 [LAUGHS]
01:00 [ENGINES REVVING]
01:02 [TIRES SCREECHING]
01:05 [ENGINES REVVING]
01:07 [ENGINES REVVING]
01:09 [ENGINES REVVING]
01:11 [MUSIC PLAYING]
01:13 Grand touring cars, aka GTs.
01:26 You've got to get from Paris to Berlin.
01:28 You're not gonna take your sports car, that's gonna beat you up.
01:31 You're not even gonna take your private jet, because airports are such a hassle.
01:35 You're gonna take a car like these.
01:38 Yeah, and these two cars, they follow the absolute classic GT formula.
01:42 Front engine, rear-wheel drive, big, powerful V8 up front,
01:46 and effortless performance.
01:48 Yeah, but I think style is also part of their recipe,
01:51 and this one misses the mark, whereas this just works.
01:55 Let me break down for you why the DB11 is such a classic modern design.
02:00 Aston has used every trick in the book to sex this car up as much as possible.
02:05 One of the classics is the highest point of the hood is directly over the axle,
02:09 which lets you know there's a big engine lurking under there.
02:12 And then it dips down at the A-pillar,
02:14 and what that does is it visually lengthens the car.
02:16 The Lexus actually has a three-inch longer wheelbase,
02:20 but you'd never know it by looking at it.
02:22 As a result, you get this lovely dash-to-axle ratio here on the DB11.
02:26 More importantly, though, when you get to the rear and you look at these big haunches,
02:29 you'll notice they've also employed the golden ratio,
02:32 meaning the roof is about twice as high as the rear wheel.
02:35 Not only does that lower the car, but then it really widens it out.
02:38 And when you get back here,
02:40 you would think that this is four feet wider than the LC500.
02:44 Only it isn't.
02:45 The Lexus is less than an inch narrower than the DB11.
02:49 They've just tricked you, and I think this car is a masterpiece.
02:52 You're right, Johnny. The DB11 is the definition of an elegant GT car,
02:57 but the Lexus, it just treads its own path.
02:59 It takes a different approach.
03:01 It rips up the rulebook in every detail.
03:04 Look at these headlights. They're just a mess of angles and shapes,
03:07 but I love that. This car's unique.
03:09 The highest point on the hood is up here on the A-pillar.
03:12 No other car in the world would do that.
03:15 But what's really cool about it, as you walk around it, it's a shapeshifter.
03:19 Everywhere you look at it, it looks like a different car.
03:22 This car could only be a product of Japan.
03:25 Okay, you've just got to imagine this car in Tokyo,
03:28 lights strobing over the hood and the roof.
03:31 This car is a spaceship, pure and simple.
03:35 Yeah, but rules, rulebooks, best practices, they exist for a reason.
03:40 You know what, Johnny? I don't care. Let's just go and drive them.
03:43 For this head-to-head, we're forgetting about the dollar signs.
03:47 Yes, at $198,995,
03:51 the DB11 is nearly double the cost of the LC500.
03:55 However, these two cars are intended to do the very same job.
04:00 In many ways, they're synonyms.
04:02 What's fascinating is how they go about it in completely different ways.
04:07 The Aston Martin features that twin-turbocharged AMG 4.0-litre
04:11 with 503 horsepower and a massive 513 foot-pounds.
04:16 Despite the LC500's sci-fi looks, it's more old-school,
04:20 sticking to a normally aspirated 5.0-litre V8
04:23 that cranks out 471 horsepower,
04:26 but a modest-sounding 398 foot-pounds.
04:29 Well, that's modest in this company.
04:31 The Lexus is about 350 pounds heavier, too,
04:35 wallowing in at 4,370 pounds,
04:38 despite mixed-material construction
04:41 featuring seven grades of high-strength steel,
04:44 aluminium, carbon-fibre-reinforced plastic,
04:46 and even a fibre glass trunk lid.
04:49 But the big Lexus fights back with some cool technology,
04:53 like its hard-hitting 10-speed automatic transmission,
04:55 a centre-of-gravity lowering carbon roof,
04:58 as well as rear-wheel steering.
05:00 But you know what? Enough talking.
05:02 Let's head to the hills above Girona and drive.
05:05 (MUSIC)
05:07 OK, so we're in the spaceship,
05:32 which over the course of Best Driver's Car
05:34 sort of became the benchmark DT.
05:36 It's really good, but before we get into how it feels
05:38 and how it drives, I gotta ask you, as an Englishman,
05:41 what does the brand Lexus mean to you?
05:44 Uh, nothing.
05:45 (LAUGHS)
05:46 I mean, literally nothing.
05:48 Do you know what? As a kid, I read about the LS 400
05:51 and how it was gonna change the world, which it sort of did.
05:54 So, that, and then the LFA and its screaming V10,
05:58 and everything else is just a big, fat zero.
06:02 Right. So, in the US, the RX outsells the BMW 3 Series.
06:06 It is the number-one luxury vehicle in America.
06:10 So, Lexus is massive,
06:12 but they kind of became, like, the car for the retired Floridian.
06:17 You know what I mean? Now they have this.
06:19 This is an education for me,
06:20 but this car makes me wanna be interested in Lexus.
06:24 I mean, so tell me, how did it do so well at Best Driver's Car?
06:27 That's the point. Well, yeah, exactly.
06:28 Well, one of the reasons it did so well was Randy Pope's,
06:31 our own Randy, he helped develop this car.
06:33 He was the race car driver that the engineering staff used to tune it.
06:37 And he was going out to Big Willow with the chief engineer and all his guys
06:41 and saying, like, "No, less understeer, more this, more that."
06:44 And, you know, it is a big, heavy car.
06:46 It's 4,370 pounds, but...
06:49 -It is heavy. -...boy, you don't feel it.
06:51 Yeah, I think what's interesting, we should say,
06:53 this car is fully specced, so it has everything that you need.
06:56 So, limited-slip diff, rear-wheel steer, carbon roof, 21-inch wheels.
07:00 It's got the full complement of performance stuff.
07:04 But to me, this is how it should come anyway.
07:06 Yeah, it's crazy that this stuff isn't standard,
07:08 especially for, you know, $92,000, which is the base price.
07:11 But that's it. It's so good.
07:14 It is good. I'm just so shocked. I really, really like it.
07:18 I absolutely love the motor.
07:21 -I love the motor. -Yes, everything...
07:22 It's a normally aspirated five-liter V8
07:25 in a world of turbocharged stuff with a million pounds of torque,
07:29 but on paper, it does the business.
07:31 I just love this engine and the thrust.
07:35 You get the throttle response, you get the noise.
07:37 It's so satisfying to drive.
07:39 And, you know, it's just one of those things where,
07:41 "Oh, it's only 471 horsepower."
07:43 It's plenty. It's plenty.
07:44 And the gearbox, the gearbox...
07:47 I mean, I just thought, "Okay, ten speeds, this will be utterly ridiculous.
07:50 I'm going to be changing gear, like, every quarter of a second or whatever."
07:54 And it's an autobox that finally does that thing they always say they're going to do,
07:58 which is match a twin clutch.
08:00 It's so punchy, so quick, so precise.
08:03 It's just brilliant.
08:04 That's the only thing I love about normally aspirated engines.
08:10 -Right. -Control.
08:11 -Yeah. -So much control.
08:13 Now, this car, the chassis is not perfect.
08:15 I think it's got...
08:16 Considering it's got that rear-wheel-steer system,
08:18 it's got more turn in a mid-corner understeer than I'd like.
08:21 But I think a lot of that understeer, especially the initial stuff, is the tires.
08:25 I think these are kind of not the tires a car this aggressive deserves.
08:29 You know? 280 tread wear.
08:32 I mean, they're basically, like, you know, long-lasting economy tires.
08:35 Yeah, I think you could do what I just did around that corner,
08:37 sort of full day, and the tires wouldn't even look like you touched them.
08:40 They're just not biting in. That is a shame, actually.
08:43 The overall package of this thing, like, you know,
08:45 look, I'm holding on to two handles.
08:47 We didn't even touch on the other real high point, this interior.
08:51 -I mean, it's so good. -It's so good.
08:53 Now, sadly, I don't know who spec'd this car.
08:55 It's black on black, so you can't really see it,
08:57 but, you know, I remember we had a red one that had this tan interior.
09:01 It's better than any Ferrari ever made.
09:04 -Just gorgeous. -And in 100 years,
09:07 it will still feel and look exactly like it does today.
09:10 Yeah, you know, Lexus, they always go on and on about how they have
09:11 these special craftsmen who can make origami animals with one hand,
09:14 and only they can sew the steering wheel, and you're like, "Yeah, whatever."
09:18 Then you get in this car, you're like, "Oh, of course!
09:19 Only someone who can make, you know, a crane with their left hand
09:23 can sew this." It's just gorgeous.
09:25 The whole car is just a surprise to me.
09:27 I really like it, and I can see why we've put the DB11 against it,
09:32 because it is a proper benchmark car, and it did well at Best Driver's Car of the Year.
09:36 It was a surprise at Best Driver's Car,
09:38 and the DB11, the V12, was the disappointment at Best Driver's Car of the Year.
09:42 No question, we brought the right car to interrogate the new DB11 V8.
09:47 The Lexus is one compelling package.
09:50 Love or loathe the styling, the engine, the chassis, the noise,
09:55 the response and that interior are impossible not to enjoy.
09:59 The Aston is in for a tough test, and we're not going to give it a freebie,
10:02 because it's traditionally been the wheels of everyone's favourite secret agent.
10:07 Dun-dun-tsh! Dun-dun-tsh!
10:09 Dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun.
10:12 -It's Bond! -OK, that's out of the way.
10:19 -Back to the car. -Right, OK.
10:21 So, gone is that 5.2-litre 600-horsepower V12 in its place,
10:26 4-litre twin-turbo V8 from AMG.
10:29 Key difference, 253 pounds have been removed from the front axle.
10:34 In fact, this engine is all the way behind that axle,
10:37 and it actually shifts the weight distribution around.
10:40 So now we've got 51% of the weight on the rear axle, 49% on the front.
10:45 If there's going to be a DB11 sports car, this is it, right?
10:48 At Best Driver's Car, it was like, "Oh, boy, that hurt to say it was last place."
10:53 But it was a GT. It couldn't even pretend to be a sports car, whereas this one...
10:58 It seems to me that what it really does is,
11:01 it makes sense of all the changes they made with the DB11 anyway.
11:04 So, the faster steering rack, it works.
11:07 It's got a bit more weight to it, which means you trust the car a little bit more.
11:10 But now the thing really, really turns
11:12 because it hasn't got a hulking great V12 with four cylinders ahead of the front axle.
11:16 And since it's an AMG, it's just buckets of torque everywhere.
11:19 So, gearbox, this is the 8-speed ZF.
11:22 I think the gearbox on the Lexus is better,
11:24 but you don't need to shift on this one because there's just torque coming out of your ears.
11:28 Yeah, I much prefer that 10-speed.
11:30 I'm going to say one demerit against the V8.
11:32 They've deliberately lost that AMG crazy, gargly, mad noise.
11:37 And I understand why they've done that.
11:39 They want it to feel like a distinct engine, and it does.
11:42 But in its place, it's sort of a whole lot of nothing.
11:45 Right. So, they turned up the mid frequencies and the high frequencies,
11:49 meaning they turned down the bass.
11:50 And that's what that AMG... It just sounds like a verbally good American,
11:54 for lack of a better term, V8.
11:56 Yeah, they turned down the bass and they turned down the character, I'm afraid.
12:00 And it's weird because, look, they ignored their own lesson, right?
12:03 You know, as Woody Allen says, "Be original, don't steal."
12:06 But if you do steal, steal from the best.
12:08 So, like, the nav system is literally straight out of a Mercedes S-Class, right?
12:13 Now, that's one thing that Lexus and Aston have had in common,
12:16 is the worst infotainment navigation system in the history of the world.
12:20 Remember the DB9, right?
12:21 The most beautiful car you've ever seen,
12:23 and then carved out of the perfect bamboo interior
12:26 is this terrible tom-tom navigation system
12:29 that would tell you you're on a road five miles that way.
12:32 To me, it never mattered because I could never figure out how to get the screen on.
12:35 I mean, I drove a thousand miles in that car,
12:38 and I'd be like, "What do I do to make this work?"
12:40 And then maybe, just as I arrived, I'd get it to go up
12:43 and I'd realize it couldn't work anyway.
12:44 -Right, exactly. -It was the most frustrating thing ever.
12:47 Right, so in other words, like, "Hey, if you're going to use an AMG engine,
12:49 use an AMG engine.
12:51 Let me hear the crowd, let me hear the guts of that crowd."
12:54 And why not? I think of Aston's heritage of, like, '80s V8 Vantages.
12:58 -Yeah. -It sounded like thunder.
13:00 -Yeah, yeah. -I could spew this huge bass noise out.
13:03 Look, for a turbo, it's good, but it's not as good as this engine.
13:08 It's not as good as itself, if that makes any sense.
13:10 I'm going to go on record and say I prefer the Lexus.
13:13 But the torque! I prefer the torque.
13:17 Compared to the Lexus, you just don't quite have the sense of excitement
13:23 when you really, really wring it out.
13:24 It is a fantastic engine. It's a fantastic engine.
13:28 I think they've dialed down the character a little bit too much.
13:31 And, I mean, give me a nap.
13:33 Naturally aspirated motor every time.
13:35 Yeah, look, they can do a DB11 V8 S, right?
13:39 And they can bring some of that character back.
13:41 And, you know, compared to the V12,
13:43 the V12 is 0-60 in 3.8 seconds. This is going to be 4.
13:46 The V12 is quarter mile in 11.9. This is going to be 12.2.
13:50 So you lose a little bit, but big deal.
13:53 Yeah, I'd trade it. I'd trade it.
13:55 Because I think the chassis balance on this car is better than the V12.
13:58 -Yeah, without question. -The turning is fantastic.
14:01 Much better than the Lexus, actually.
14:02 It doesn't have that understeer in the mid-corner.
14:05 And it just feels more focused,
14:08 but without losing that lovely GT feel to it as well.
14:11 So I propose, because in my mind,
14:13 boy, I could declare either one of these the winner.
14:15 -It's so close. -It's not settled.
14:17 But I think if we take them to a track,
14:19 we'll expose, really expose the flaws of each
14:21 and figure out which car wins the head-to-head.
14:24 I always vote racetrack. Let's go.
14:26 And what a racetrack we found.
14:30 I'm sure I'm butchering the name,
14:32 but this is Park Motor Castagioli.
14:35 Not too far from Barcelona, right in the shadow of Montserrat.
14:39 You see that crossover?
14:41 It's like a giant toy train set made real.
14:44 And I love it.
14:45 More importantly, as the final battleground
14:48 for these two big sporty GTs,
14:51 Castagioli is frankly perfect.
14:54 One final note, thank God for extra tires.
14:57 So here we are on the racetrack,
15:02 and the Lexus, here, is almost a hundred meters.
15:06 It shouldn't, because a 4,370-pound object
15:10 should be repulsed by a racetrack.
15:12 Yeah, and on the road, it sort of felt like it was really not going to work
15:16 because of that understeer that we could feel.
15:18 And it's still here,
15:20 but there's a lot of other really good stuff going on.
15:22 Yeah, and the understeer on a track that I'm not very familiar with,
15:25 it kind of makes it a little safe, you know?
15:27 And then because you don't have buckets of torque like in the Aston,
15:32 you're not snapping out of corners and stuff like that,
15:34 so the car has a balance to it.
15:36 I would say it feels fluid, if you know what I mean.
15:39 All the reactions are really, really fluid.
15:41 I think you do get, in the really tight corners,
15:44 you get some understeer,
15:45 but through that long corner like that,
15:47 the four-wheel steer definitely helps.
15:49 It definitely seems to just give the car stability and some proper bite.
15:53 The only thing I'd say, you have to drive it in quite a particular way
15:57 because it has got that initial understeer,
15:59 so you can't bully it on the way in.
16:01 That means on the way out, you do miss the torque.
16:03 It's not a car for setting lap times.
16:06 This would be a great car for instructing somebody
16:08 on the importance of being smooth on a track.
16:11 Yeah, I agree.
16:12 The smoother you are, the better it feels.
16:14 Yeah, smooth, fluid, maybe not a 10/10 car,
16:18 but definitely not a 7/10.
16:19 I think you're 8.8/10 or something.
16:21 Yeah, exactly.
16:24 The tenth between the tenths.
16:25 But if we can get decent tires on this car, could you imagine?
16:28 I'm just shocked that this car is at home on the track as it is.
16:33 I remember talking with Randy about what he was working with
16:37 and that he really likes balanced cars.
16:40 He actually likes cars with a little bit of understeer.
16:42 He always talks about how he has a negative 10 understeer
16:46 to positive 10 oversteer,
16:47 and what he likes for a track car is about a minus one understeer
16:50 because he likes balance.
16:51 He doesn't like to fight the rear end when he's trying to go fast.
16:54 We're talking about GT cars and it's got that effortless feel.
16:57 It gives you access to the performance effortlessly.
17:00 If you step over the edge, it's not an edge, it's a nice gentle slope,
17:04 so you've got all this fluidity just built into the car.
17:07 I'm having a blast.
17:08 It's just a beautiful little car.
17:10 It's a giant car.
17:11 Yeah, I'm even more confused now than I was on the road.
17:15 Right.
17:16 I just expect when we come to the track,
17:18 the Aston will be like, "Twice as good. Game over. Done."
17:24 Once again, the LC500 confounds expectations.
17:29 Okay, it's not a Shelby GT350R,
17:32 but for a grand tourer, it really enjoys this fabulous track.
17:36 We would have happily kept lapping all day in the Lexus
17:40 if only there wasn't a DB11 V8 with a purple interior
17:43 that we needed to jump into.
17:45 Plus, it must be my turn to drive.
17:47 Okay, right off the bat, I'm going to tell you that in terms of sound,
17:53 I'm talking about the quality of the sound,
17:55 I just mean the volume of it.
17:57 The Aston's got that Lexus killed on the track.
18:00 On the road, you may not want that much sound,
18:03 but on the track, it works.
18:05 I want to hear...
18:06 It's doing it.
18:08 It really works. The whole car, as soon as you roll out the pit lane,
18:11 it feels more immediate.
18:13 The noise is part of that.
18:15 The way it turns in is another part of that.
18:17 It doesn't have the understeer that we talked about in the Lexus
18:20 and the performance.
18:22 I mean, it's got so much of it.
18:25 Yeah, what an engine.
18:26 You're really not missing the V12 on the gear at all.
18:29 I mean, you are surfing this endless wave of torque.
18:32 It's addictive.
18:33 It's really good.
18:34 It's just barely down the straight like this.
18:37 You're probably 20 miles an hour faster by the end of it.
18:40 It is. It is.
18:41 And it does score over the Lexus in those ways,
18:43 but I have to say, apart from the turning phase,
18:47 where the Aston definitely gets into the corner a bit better than the Lexus,
18:50 yet after that, you're working a lot harder in this car.
18:54 The balance that was so evident in that Lexus,
18:57 it's not as evident here.
18:59 You're always working the steering, working against that torque, basically.
19:03 The Lexus, once you get past the initial understeer and you take a set,
19:08 it's brilliant.
19:09 It just carves these wonderful arcs.
19:12 You're moving around with the throttle and you can relax, you can look up.
19:15 You think about the next corner.
19:17 In this thing, you're just fighting the car the whole time.
19:20 You don't relax.
19:21 You're definitely a lot busier
19:22 and it makes you think a lot more about when you get on the throttle.
19:26 It also makes you think a lot more about when you get on the brakes.
19:29 Yeah, which you freak out on.
19:30 So, on the road, I really prefer these brakes to the Lexus brakes
19:35 because there was no initial bite on the Lexus,
19:37 but when I got in this car after you, the pedal was gone.
19:40 Yeah, we've done now a couple of laps together.
19:43 We're not going flat out because we're talking and everything
19:46 and the pedal is long.
19:48 I just don't get it.
19:49 If Porsche can make a Panamera Turbo S brake that lasts forever...
19:54 Two years. Two years before the Fates showed up.
19:57 It's not acceptable that they don't.
19:58 I know these are GT cars.
20:00 They're not cars necessarily built for a racer.
20:02 That's a $200,000 car and this is a $200,000 car.
20:06 Yeah, and it's just...
20:07 Rumbo's a supplier.
20:09 It's about that depth of engineering.
20:12 The confidence gives you about the rest of the car.
20:14 I think it's missing.
20:15 That's the thing.
20:16 You're 20 miles an hour at the end of the straights,
20:19 and then instead of thinking about the corner,
20:21 I'm just worried about not going off into the gravel trap
20:24 because I don't trust these brakes.
20:25 -They feel terrible. -Yeah.
20:27 Which leads us to a bit of a conundrum
20:30 because usually at this point in the video, I like to go,
20:32 "The winner of this head-to-head is..."
20:34 But I got no idea. I can go either way.
20:36 It's tough.
20:37 For me, the Aston arrives just a nose ahead from the road.
20:41 Yeah, it's a better road car, for sure.
20:43 It's a better road car. There's more of a sense of occasion as well.
20:46 But on the track, the Lexus has probably clawed back that deficit
20:50 and nosed itself in front.
20:52 But does it really matter how big, fat GT cars perform on a racetrack?
20:59 -To me? -Yeah.
21:00 -I mean... -President company excluded.
21:02 Always.
21:04 No, no, you're right.
21:05 It doesn't matter how they perform on the track.
21:07 -Okay, so... -It's nice to know, but it doesn't.
21:10 I mean, these are GT cars.
21:11 You have to take it back to the road.
21:13 You have to.
21:14 So if we do that, then this Aston, it wins by a smidge.
21:18 -Yeah, a smidge. -A smidge.
21:20 -Maybe. -The Lexus is right there,
21:23 but I think the Aston Martin DB11 V8...
21:26 Yeah, it's the winner.
21:29 -All right, you can do that. -A smidge and a half.
21:34 That might be two smidges. I'm gonna call that two smidges.
21:37 [MUSIC PLAYING]
21:39 [MUSIC PLAYING]
21:41 [MUSIC PLAYING]
21:43 [MUSIC PLAYING]
21:45 [MUSIC PLAYING]
21:47 (whooshing)