Plug-in hybrid Aston Martin for Bond?
Number24
NorwayPosts: 22,334MI6 Agent
AM is making a 1000 horse power hybrid plug-in car. I think it would work. That should be fast enough. For tactical use it can be useful to be able to move quietly when driving slow, and at high speeds the gas engine kicks in and produces the roar and speed we expect from a Bond car. I have some problems seeing Bond drive an all-electric car like the Tesla, but the AM plug-in hybrid would show Bond moving with the times while maintaining tradition. What do you think?
Comments
You can read this fascinating article here:
https://blogs.spectator.co.uk/2015/05/if-i-were-prime-minister-by-ian-fleming/#
An excerpt:
After dealing with the spiritual comfort of the electorate, I would proceed to his physical state, and my first step would be the abatement of noise, carbon-monoxide gas and exasperation caused by the traffic problem in our big towns. I would solve these with the help of Mr Francis Bacon’s recently invented, much-publicized battery. Our present internal-combustion engine is a ridiculous steam-age contraption which turns only a modest proportion of fuel into energy and spews the rest out in the form of petrol vapour of a more or less solid consistency. When there is no wind, this lies in a dense layer in our streets and we breathe it in day and night. It then rises into the upper atmosphere, where I am told, it forms a kind of envelope round the world which has the effect of interfering with the beneficial rays of the sun. Whether that is so or not, the petrol engine is obviously a noxious and noisy machine, and I would gradually abolish and replace it by some form of electric motor. This would take some time, but I would hope that, within three years of assuming office, I could have converted the whole of central London to electric transport. Very cheap, State-owned garages would be built at the point of entry into London of our main roads and drives would there transfer into electric buses or the Underground and later into cheap, state-run electric taxis. There would be quiet, no smell and no parking problems. Gradually I would extend this system to our other great towns and in due course the problem would be solved for the whole country.
Yes, I'd say so. -{
1. GE 2. MR 3. OP 4. TMWTGG 5. TSWLM 6. TND 7. TWINE 8.DN 9. GF 10. AVTAK
Pushing the envelope there!
No, can't see them ever going for that in a Bond film. Wait...
It does seem something that John Gardner might have introduced in Licence Renewed (1981).
In LR Bond drove a Saab 900 turbo. ( At the time one of my big brothers had one )
New technology and giving it to Bond ?
A plug in hybrid car would be the business if it had the right combination of looks, gadgets and exposition; which the Astons no doubt have offered in the past.
Though Fleming’s personal cars sometimes were of the mundane, like his Morris Oxford or Riley, he did own I think 2 Thunderbirds that IMO were not necessarily indications of a flair for the modern but more for their macho qualities. Since Fleming is on the record for being an advocate of electric cars, one would wonder why he didn’t somehow feature in his stories at least one of the several models of electric cars that already existed, in the same way he worked into DAF the innovative Studillac as Felix Leiter’s car. I therefore believe that as far as Bond was concerned, Fleming preferred the sexier aspects of motoring vs. any idea of putting Bond into the blander alternative of a futuristic electric car.
Just a little info on a Bland electric car ?
- The car in question is a hybrid and not a fully electric car, so it has a powerful gasoline engine that roars.
- The car is an Aston Martin and won't look much more fururistic than the AM 10.
The plan is to make a plug-in version of the DBX Crossover, so it'll look pretty much like this:
My only "objection" is that I'd rather he drove a Bentley than an Aston Martin, but no issue with the idea of a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle.