ASTON MARTIN VALHALLA

V8, three electric motors and 1064bhp yet 'friendly' Aston dynamics too: can it really deliver all that?

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The Valhalla may be an Aston Martin like no other, but it isn't a supercar like no other. It's a two-seat, carbonfibre-tubbed coupé, with a mid-mounted turbocharged vee engine supplemented by an electric motor, plus two electric motors driving its front axle.

And if that sounds familiar, the likes of the Lamborghini Revuelto, Ferraris F80 and SF90, McLaren Artura and even Honda NSX have had some kind of shades of this layout. Did the Porsche 918 Spyder do it first? But will the Valhalla do it best? This brief drive of the new supercar/hypercar, as you prefer, to be priced at £850,000 and limited to 999 units when deliveries start next spring, was of a late prototype, with productionready hardware but software about 85-90% complete.

Software sign-off can be left to the very last minute before deliveries these days. And there's a lot of it to wrap together when you consider how many Valhalla systems need to be tuned into becoming a cohesive driver's car.

The major mechanical piece, the engine, takes MercedesAMG's 4.0-litre V8 as a starting point, but rather than the usual Aston cross-plane crank kind, it's the AMG GT Black Series version, which has 180deg planes. It makes 817bhp and 632lb ft on its own, both at 6700rpm (see sidebar, p27), Aston says, and revs to 7000rpm.

It's mated to an eight-speed dual-clutch automatic gearbox that has an integrated electric motor and no reverse gear. After the gearbox is an electronically controlled limited-slip differential for the rear axle. At the front there are two electric motors, one for each front wheel (the front e-motors also do the reversing).

Aston won't share individual motor outputs, but combined they add 248bhp. Meld these four power contributors together and their combined maximum outputs are 1064bhp and 811lb ft.