What is it?
If you, like me, have an unhealthy and somewhat embarrassing fondness for the monstrosity that is the BMW X7 M50i, Alpina’s take - the XB7 - should be right up your alley.
Lordy, it’s a big boy: hardly a car that’s best suited to a more incognito style of transport. The standard BMW X7 is already a fairly potent exercise in excess, but with its enormous optional 23in rims (the largest yet fitted to an Alpina), an extended body kit, those trademark Deco lines and a set of quad exhausts, the XB7 is better described as a monolithic celebration of four-wheeled opulence. Sure, it doesn’t quite take things to Rolls-Royce Cullinan levels, but I still can’t help but respect its ridiculousness.
In addition to all that new exterior finery, the regular X7 M50i’s mechanical hardware has also been Alpinafied to bring it up to XB7 specification. Buchloe has strapped a brace of larger turbochargers to BMW’s 4.4-litre V8 engine and completely overhauled the car’s cooling system. There’s a new stainless-steel sports exhaust in the mix, too.
The result is a massive 613bhp and 590lb ft – figures that represent respective increases of 90bhp and 37lb ft over the ‘standard’ X7 M50i.
An eight-speed automatic gearbox jointly developed by Alpina and ZF has been fitted to cope with the uprated engine’s power, while the xDrive four-wheel drive system has also been tweaked.
Our test car also features a set of optional enormous drilled and ventilated disc brakes - handy on a machine that weighs in at 2.6 tonnes and can hit 62mph from a standstill in just 4.2sec.
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And A Porsche Taycan Turismo with a few options can cost similar, which would you chose?
When did this kind of overweight, oversized vehicle become what the nouveau-riche want to be seen in? Have to blame the Yanks.
Yikes love to be at BMW,s design dept when this was signed off. Grotesque grill tick. Over glitzed exterior additions tick, dashboard that looks like all other boring BMW,s tick Overpriced tick so what is there not to like Urrrr Class it certainly has not got Mind that boot would hold a load of weed I guess ! .
Yikes love to be at BMW,s design dept when this was signed off. Grotesque grill tick. Over glitzed exterior additions tick, dashboard that looks like all other boring BMW,s tick Overpriced tick so what is there not to like Urrrr Class it certainly has not got Mind that boot would hold a load of weed I guess ! .