Aston Martin only ever produced one Bulldog. The company killed the project after it reached 191 miles per hour in late 1979. It was an impressive feat for the time but didn’t meet Aston’s intended goal of hitting 237 mph. However, after 40 years and a 7,000-hour restoration, the wedge-shaped spaceship finally broke the 200-mile-per-hour barrier.
The Bulldog hit 205.4 mph at Machrihanish Airfield in Scotland. That’s still below the projected top speed, but it did breach the 200-mph mark, which few new cars can even achieve. The 40-year-old Aston Martin completed the run with a twin-turbocharged 5.3-liter V8 engine. The power plant produced 600 horsepower and 500 pound-feet of torque in the late 1970s.
However, Classic Motor Cars planned to increase its output to 650 hp for the 200-mph attempt. The aftermarket specialist also tinkered with and tested the car to ensure it could handle the speed, spending hundreds of more hours tuning and adjusting the Bulldog after completing the restoration process.
Tim Griffin, Classic Motor Cars’ managing director, previously said that the company performed a balancing act between maintaining the Bulldog’s originality while ensuring it could safely hit 200 mph. The shop added modern fuel injection to the engine and strengthened the gearbox during the 18-month restoration and testing process.
Aston designed the car in 1977, hoping it’d reach 200 mph and much more. Sadly, the Bulldog never entered production, not that Aston had planned to produce thousands of them. After deciding it would be too costly, the automaker killed the project, extinguishing any hopes that it’d ever make the planned dozen or so models. Aston sold the only example to its Saudi customer before it passed between various owners.
Its wild design and gullwing doors will turn heads with only one in existence. The car was spotted in London in 2021 and at the Concorso d’Eleganza Villa d’Este in 2022 as Classic Motor Cars prepped the vehicle. In late 2021, the Aston hit 162 mph during testing, and it has come a long way since then.
