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DB3S Customer Cars

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DB3S Customer Cars

(1954 - 1956)

Following on from the success of the team cars, Aston Martin offered the DB3S for sale to wealthy enthusiasts for both fast road use and also of course for the race track. Introduced for sale at the 1954 Motor Show, the slippery Frank Freely styled DB3S was extremely expensive at £3684 inclusive of UK taxes; the fixed head coupe was an astronomical £4800. Twenty production cars were built in total, a figure which includes the three fixed head coupes.

DB3S Customer Cars

DB3S/101, 323AHA

DB3S/102, DB3S/103

The two cars pictured here are chassis numbers 102 and 103. These cars together with a third were raced by an Australian/New Zealand based team known as ‘The Kangaroo Stable’ in European events.

DB3S/105 HSK110

DB3S/106

This is DB3S/106 which was purchased for racing in the Far East. After crashing in 1963, it’s remains were rebuilt during the late 70’s. Thankfully the car is now based in Europe and is seen occasionally at AMOC classic racing events.

To the left above pictures illustrate DB3S/108. The middle picture well illustrates the Alfin drum brakes fitted to production cars – the disc brakes of the works cars were an expensive optional extra.

DB3S/110 has no early racing history but thankfully is now regularly see at classic racing events.

DB3S/112, OSJ669

This very attractive car is DB3S/112 which was originally sold to the first owner in the USA. After being very seriously damaged, it was rebuilt back in the UK and painted in these traditional American racing colours. I’m afraid that I only saw this car once at the 2000 AMOC St John Horsfall meeting at Silverstone.

DB3S/113, SXD9

This DB3S is chassis number 113 and was originally supplied as a Fixed head Coupe with many unique features. Recently it has unexpectedly been rebuilt as an open car although thankfully according to the 2005 edition of the AM register, the original body has been retained.

DB3S/116, 88HME

Instead of going straight to the race track like other customer cars, DB3S/116 was purchased by the Rank Organization and appeared in the film Checkpoint. I saw this car for the first time very recently at the VSCC Donnington Park meeting in June 2002 and again at an AMOC meeting in 2008.