John Williams, longtime automotive enthusiast. He turned his 1973 second-hand Aston Martin DB5 into an epic story of restoration and nostalgia. The car, popularized by James Bond in the legendary movies “Goldfinger” and “Thunderball,” sat forgotten and decaying on his driveway for a number of years. Now, after a deserving overhaul, its value has soared to an appraised £1 million.
Williams for £985, more than 45 years ago. This specific model is one of just 39 DB5 Vantage variants ever produced. He continued to love the car for several years. Prior to allowing it to rust in the Middle East during the late 1970s, he personally decided to actually let it rust. The formerly beleaguered auto became a beloved toy for neighborhood kids. They jumped up and down on its hood, forcing Williams and his wife, Susan, to often scold them.
The couple was under financial pressure and began to consider selling the car. They decided to put money aside to rebuild it. Williams expressed his commitment to reviving the vehicle, stating, “Money comes into it and reality, and sitting at the kitchen table he said ‘what do you think?’”
Once in the UK, the restoration process took three years at Aston Martin’s Buckinghamshire works. Toasting our technicians Technicians spent more than 2,500 hours on part replacements and the restoration of lost features. Their team painstakingly extracted the little home from the car. They then painstakingly restored it back to its original silver birch grey color.
“It would almost be easier to build a brand new car, but to actually repair and put new sections into a very heavily corroded car like this one took an awful lot of skill and patience.” – Steve Waddingham
Even in this dilapidated state, the Aston Martin DB5 still commanded a price of £500,000. Now, fully restored, it serves as a three-dimensional piece of automotive art and cinematic history.
Waddingham, who led the car’s restoration, shared that emotional connection as he and the show’s readers began to unpack many people’s feelings toward the car. It’s a total sensory experience just to be around this vehicle. You smell it, you feel it, you hear the bad ass sound that it creates, he explained. Now, he magnified its importance tremendously. The locations are really quite special, and those iconic cinematic moments remain indelibly imprinted,” he concluded.
Williams followed his own dream and revived the classic vehicle. It had mostly been left to pot with the rust on his driveway. His passion turned the car into a great piece of art. It succeeded in capturing its physical splendor and deep historical significance.
The Aston Martin DB5 is a perfect example of a story that extends far past its window sticker. It preserves the invaluable memories and experiences of the Williams family of decades past. Susan Williams reminisced about the kids wanting to jump on the car, curious because of its connection to James Bond. She even told the story of one person who climbed up on the roof and asked, “Is this thing working? He’d watched the new Bond movie and thought it would shoot him up.