On the plus side, after production moved to Germany, these V12s became very reliable, not having any major issues. But on the negative, they like to eat ignition coils faster than most cars. Likely due to the coils buried deep under the intake manifolds with absolutely no air circulation. And this, once every 30k mile service is a major pain in the butt. If everything goes perfect (very unlikely given how old these cars are now), it takes about 6 hrs to R&R the coils and spark plugs. I would budget about 3x that time if its your first time and you just want to take your time and enjoy freshening things up as you go.
Most of the major parts can be readily purchased without the Aston tax directly from Ford, NGK etc.. But the intake gasket is quite unique. And not really worth modifying the v6 Mondeo ones. The PCV valves are also another issue. Although the valve itself is just a $2 Motorcraft part, the harness its glued into is not readily available. One would have to make something up by cutting up different hoses. Being my first time doing the job and wanting to get it done quickly (for reasons I won't get into now), I bought the assembly from Aston. But when I get time, I will try to figure out how to put something together from Ford bits. I think the 80s Mustang SVO turbo has a useful 90 deg bend PCV valve hose that would work here.
Another thing about the PCV harness is that on my car, at 61k miles, the plastic unions in it that create Ts had split and I had a small pool of oily grime just under it. The hose to the air/oil separator had also glued itself in place. Making it a very tedious job to remove given its position in the car. This whole assembly lives right under the wiper arms so its a very awkward position to work. I found it best to lean between the two corner engine brace points.
Another piece of plastic that became very brittle and broke as soon as I touched it was the vacuum pipes for the fuel pressure sensors (?). Luckily I had some high quality turbo silicone vacuum lines on hand. Otherwise that would have stalled things. I re-used the rubber 90deg fittings and just cut the plastic tube short and fit my silicone hose over it.
On the intake manifold gasket, after doing this job, I think it can be reused at least once. There is a lot of rubber on the gaskets and it all looked in good shape after 25k miles. But with all the labor involved to get down there, I think people are too afraid to experiment here.
For the 2009+ DB9, Aston moved to a double platinum NGK #7 heat plug, This doesn't exist without the Aston tax. NGK won't sell you the PTR7E-13 directly. Given how often one needs to change coils, there is absolutely no need for a double platinum plug, which would otherwise last at least 70k miles in a clean running engine. I went with NGK TR7IX, a single Iridium plug, gapped to 0.047", which is the bottom of the factory recommended gap range of 0.047" to 0.051". The plugs come factory gapped at 0.040" and according to NGK tech support, one shouldn't move the ground electrode more than 0.008" to prevent compromising the weld/solder joint.
The coils, I went with DMCoil coils direct from Aliexpress. They were about $20/each with shipping from China. Which was surprisingly quick, like one week I think. I'd rather support a Chinese company directly, than a British or American company making parts in China.
The standard Siemens injectors are easily serviced as they were OEM for GM, Chyrsler and Ford at one point. But I wanted the AM factory correct colors for the O-rings, which took some hunting as all the service kits I could find were just black. I eventually found the correct blue and green colors from injector-rehab.com, along with some new filter baskets. Was my first time changing filter baskets in a fuel injector, but it was super easy. My car stands at 61.5k miles and having done the job, my filter baskets looked in pretty good shape. So no real need to change them I think. But a good cleaning can't help. Their rebuild service will change the o-rings and filters and clean the injectors for like $18/each. Worth doing once a decade I think. If your car doesn't get driven as much as mine, your injectors will be a bit gummed up after all these years.
I usually use Mobil 1 0w40. Its a good budget oil if you are doing sub 5k mile oil changes. You can get 12qts from Walmart for like $50. This was the first time I tried the bag. Its a bit heavy to lift but otherwise a good option if you want to cut down on plastic waste. You will obviously need alternative reusable containers to dispose of your old oil.
The job itself is not complicated and doesn't require any special tools but is very labour intensive. Just the sheer time working the fasteners is incredible. The only trick I would say anyone would need to know about doing this job is how to remove the brake servo vacuum connection from the driver's side manifold. Hold the outer plastic ring and pull the inner fitting out. It comes out in a 2secs once you've figured it out. Thanks to Aston1936 for this, as I was stumped by it too.
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