Elliot Abeel's X5M & Z3 M Coupe
Photography by Matt Petrie
The X5M is undoubtedly one of the best daily drivers out there. If you can afford one, there is really nothing better you can ask for in a vehicle. The power, comfort, handling, and the space; it's all present. Alright, I suppose you could ask for a few more MPG's, but the feeling you get when you can keep up with the best sports cars on the road quickly engages amnesia on its fuel efficiency.
Having a black X5M, Elliot had the vision of creating a purely evil truck. As with any “murdered out” theme, the little pieces around the truck were darkened. Turner Motorsports carbon fiber kidney grills and iND black side gills and reflectors completed that look. In my opinion, what sets this truck apart from other attempts at murdering out is that Elliot avoided tinting the headlights and tail lights as well as blacking out the roundels. People often smoke or tint everything for the sake of the black out, when it really just takes away from the classiness of the vehicle; he gets the point across without going overboard. As a matter of fact, Meguiar's car cleaning products recognized this truck among a select handful of cars in the euro techniks car club as an outstanding vehicle to represent their company with a full sponsorship.
The size and stance add to the sinister demeanor of the truck while the Lux V3 angel eye bulbs anthropomorphize this SAV into a true monster. Aggressively lowered on KW V3 coil overs, he wanted to slam the truck as low as he could while maintaining the functionality for daily usage. Elliot and I were laughing over the reactions his truck received from the online BMW community and on social media. Many people argued that it was pointless to lower an SUV as much as he did, deeming it useless as a truck. In actuality the X5M was designed to be a fast family hauler allowing you load up the hatch at Home Depot, and then dust a domestic muscle car on your way home. Aside from lowering the truck he also added a BPM tune pumping the truck to over 600 horsepower, raising the bar from domestic muscle cars into the next tier. Putting that power down to four wheels helps, but planting it with 295/325 tires ensures that this truck will stick during launch control and feel confident around any corner.
21” 3pc BC Forged HC052 wheels with a gloss black lip/flat black face fill in the wheel wells perfectly and has just the right amount of contrast on itself to cleverly play into the all black theme. Around the back, a blacked out custom exhaust built by AUTOcouture Motoring gives the truck a great sound without drawing any attention to the rear end. Up front a BMW Performance lip adds to the fierce prowess this truck has as it rides up on you in the rear view mirror.
This X5M would be more than plenty for anyone, but when the weekend rolls around Elliot has a little trick up his sleeve in the form of a Z3 M Coupe. He always had a certain love for these cars and knew one day he'd own one. To many peoples' surprise, this is actually his second M Coupe. He lost his 30,000 mile black Z3 M Coupe to flooding during a hurricane that blew through the North East a couple of years ago. Once he and his family squared away the other damage that had been done, it was time to get back on track to find a replacement Z3. After a couple of months of searching, a Titanium Silver, California car turned up. To his benefit he found one that was just under 8,000 miles at the time of purchase.
Being that it is a later model Z3, it is powered by the S54 engine, tuned down slightly to compensate for the lack of weight compared to its E46 M3 counterpart. Despite the power difference, it is still more powerful and rarer than the previous S52 motor. Elliot wasn’t ready to settle for just a low mileage S54, he still needed more. He fitted this car with genuine 18” Kinesis K28 wheels that were previously refinished in a two stage gunmetal color which plays off of the silver well. He lowered the M Coupe on KW V1 coil overs and sourced an equally rare Meisterschaft Titanium GT exhaust which has a distinct sound as the S54 rips through the power band.
In doubling the miles on the car since he bought it, Elliot is clearly not worrying about absolute preservation, however it does live most of it's life in the garage. As a garage queen there’s always plans in store for the future of the car, but he wants to keep it simple and not overdone. We can respect that because we understand 9 times out of 10 less is more, especially with a car as unmolested as this one.
With all of that power packed into a lightweight sports car, you could image how much fun he has romping on it through the quiet, winding farm roads in his area. When he comes home he has an X5M waiting for him to pick his friends up for a night out in the city. On a beautiful day, the choice between which vehicle to take can be rather stressful, but isn’t it a dilemma you’d love to find yourself in?
