When I first saw the Masearti GranTurismo in London, I was shocked with its design. The aggressive look and curvely lines made it very unique. As its designer said, a car should both have feminine and muscular lines! And GranTurismo have them both. The front wheel arches are reflecting the female side and the aggressive front is reflecting the muscular side. When it is compared with rivals like Mercedes CL, Ferrari 612, Aston Martin DB9; GranTurismo can be considered as the best looking GT car! Its uniqueness does not end up in design. It has a very special automatic gearbox. GranTurismo S is equipped with double clutch high tech transmission and GranTurismo S Automatic is coming with a proper automatic gear box. And there is nothing unusual with these. The unusual thing is the new Automatic gearbox's ability to handle high revs. As the automatic gearboxes are transferring energy by hydraulic, it has some limitations. Automatic gearboxes cannot able to handle more than 6800rpm but Maserati did something very unusual and increased this physical limit to 7200rpm. Even the Mercedes McLaren SLR cannot be achieved this performance!
Despite the exquisite design of GranTurismo it has some drawbacks. Matter of fact, Maserati does not have very good reputation in reliability. During last couple of years, Maserati's quality significantly improved but the brand still has that image. In addition; when the GranTurismo first introduced, it had a very funny problem! When you put into reverse with its lazy gearbox which is not available anymore, the car first moves forwards and moves reverse! It was mentioned in CAR Magazine and it was really pity. They did great design and the transmission doesn't even know the meaning of reverse. Hopefully, Italian threw that gearbox into trash and it is all history.
Despite its reliability question marks in my mind, I would definitely buy this car if I had the money! I know buying a Maserati is risky, may be this risky character of Maserati is more attractive than other cars. If this blog is being read by a lady, I can summarize the issue like this; Maserati is a hurting high heels (Picture; Giuseppe Zanotti) but it looks great and you look great. You know that, if you buy those shoes, you will suffer but you bought it already ;) I remember this from my friend Andri. She liked a high heels and they were not very comfortable and she bought them :) I would do the same with GranTurismo, but the minor problem is the price tage ;)Picture are from;
Maserati Website
Net-A-Porter Website
