Skunkworks

hi there and welcome to a very englishepisode of ignition this car was built by aston martin in the same workshop wherethey made the 177 they have badge it a lagonda they have named it the taraf andthey're charging $1,000,000 but is it any good i flew all the way across thepond to find out aston martin is relaunching the lagonda brand why because sedans and in oh yes suvs outsell two-door sports cars by a wide marginlagonda is over 100 years old they made a name for themselves making sportyforeign six-cylinder two seaters and even won the 24 hours of lemon but like mostcar companies they went bankrupt in the nineteen thirties however a new ownerafter winning a bidding war against

rolls-royce brought in none other thanwo bentley himself sign and build laganas culminating with the awesome1939 rapide industrialist david brown whose initials but the dbe into astonsbought lagonda after world war two and from time to time would release a four-dooraston martin usually bad repead then in the mid-nineteen seventies came thewillingham towns lagonda in production or something resembling productions formore than a decade it's often said that the only round part of the lagonda are the wheels instead of an instrumentcluster the lagonda has three tiny tv sets that never worked

rumor holds that they nearly bankruptthe company as you can see the taraf share something a resemblance with thebrilliant william towns car in fact a taraf is the larger longer vehicle asidefrom the never working tv's another lagonda beef with the snug back seat the taraf does not have this problem which one of these two looks better without everthinking it i'm just gonna go with my childhood memories and say thewedge-shaped green one it's a true classic regardless of which one i like betterthe relationship between aston and lagonda has been renewed by the taraf a cynic would look at the taraf and sayit's just a repean with a body kit within that

cynic doesn't know very much about modern carbuilding this is how you do it the taraf sits on aston martins v8 platform thesame platform they've been using for ever and yes they are getting away withit with the introduction of the all-new db 11 however just like how all futurerolls royces the phantom the ghost the whatever will be built on an aluminumspace frame this car is built on the underpinnings of other aston martins andthat's fine you only beat include the familiar 5.9 liter v12 still built ingermany that's been in production for a very long time in this state of tune itmakes an under stress 540 horsepower there's still a tourque tubeconnecting it to a rear-mounted

transaxle the body is 100% carbon fibergo and find me another carbon fiber sedan i'll wait just kidding there aren'tany as far as the looks go i mean it is long and low andwide got this sexy tumble home and this incredible sharp crease still has thegorgeous aston martin front fender this c-pillar has to be the best-looking c-pillarin the business not crazy about the color of the little bit a camry beigebut you can get into any color you like and i just it's one of those cars youhave to see in person two dimensions don't do it justice andthe more time you spend with it the more you'll like it personally i think it isjust brilliant

behind the wheel of the lagonda taraf let's start by talking about those extra eight inches whatthey do is they get the car a wheel base intense longer than a hundred and twentyfive inches so what is that longer that well longer than jaguar xj long wheel baselonger than mercedes-benz s class long wheel base and just over an inch shorterthan the all-new bmw 7 series long wheel base so competitively speaking that's the size you have between the wheels but i would say much more importantly thoseextra inches help the taraf drive just great i was notexpecting much from this car i sort of thought they'd be here making a lot ofexcuses and trying not to hurt aston martin's feelings but this thing rides great

huge pothole thought it was going to be this major impact nope i just left the suspension in normal mode because it's so good why bother making its stiffer very elegant yet sporting car speaking ofwhich i have the transmission sport mode i just like the way it drives that way andwhat i love about this car all modern aston martin is you put in sport mode turn the car offcome back to the next morning start up it's still in sport mode it's great now these buttons and really everything i'mlooking at is this a classic aston martin in fact if i blindfold you andwalk in the car took it off you think your in a rapide or in db9 so this isthe worst part of the car gauges are

that legible is no indicator red line ofthe tachometer spins backwards i can't clear this ice warning thing doesn't sixdegrees celsius outside and you know it's just a little old the navsystem not that good but there is a solution let me show you something there is little devices nowand they're crazy you can talk into them and see where you'd like to go and it'lltell you turn-by-turn how to get there they mightonly be for the very rich but you know if the nav system isn't good enough so even though it might look like a db9 in here it does notdrive like one and that is a hundred percent due to the wonderful transmission

this transmission this vedette eight speedis the brits love to say solves every single complaint i've ever had about amodern aston martin the car drive so good so impossibly well i was talking to myfriend at aston martin why did it take you so you like it then you'regonna like the new aston martin that are coming i love it not just a matter of like this is howthey always all should have been no more excuses to be made it's wonderful i was very surprised bythis car is almost cynical they want to relaunch the look on the brand technically this isn't an aston martinand there was gonna middle east only car which they did such a good job with this car that other people wantedso aston's new ceo andy palmer he did a

crash mini engineering program and nowthey're selling this thing in the uk and america some acceleration for you this car is just awesome million dollar question is the taraf worth it to answer that i'm going to show you my watch this is a casio g-shock aviator and i picked up in japanfor about $300 soon as i got back to the states i realize you can get the exactsame watch on amazon for $260 swiss watchmaker recad mill which very well might be pronounced richard mill i don't know because i don't buy watches that cost two milliondollars yes they make a two million dollar watch and you know what does ittell time just like my casio but that's

not the point clearly there's some newmoney silliness going on with a car like this old russian joke like hey boris checking out new tie $500.00 serg you idiot same tie across the street $1,000 theresome of that ok fine but to really understand this car you have to go where it lives where it spend it's life there's area calledberkeley square there the other day and there are more s classes than there aretaxicabs so you know if you hang around there why would you buy a maybach why would you get another rolls-royce or a bentley if you need a sedan get this so yes if you have the money absolutely the taraf is worth it not expected to like this carall that much instead i love it just a

unique experience very special car veryspecial car hey youtubers did you like that episode of ignition you just watched well guesswhat is a brand new one right now watch the latest episode of ignitionright now on motor trend on demand ready and i'll do one's normal for youok which obviously is the one cyrus will use the service your watching it nowuses take many british i can't think of anything that's all that i can think i saw thoseon saturday unknowingly practice like all great just let me start off as asingle stock shed you so give us show

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