Acura ZDX owner removes power plenum beak, adds Pentagon style grille in its place

If you’re a ZDX owner and want to freshen up your crossover, this is one way to do it.

Acura ZDX owner and Honda Factory Accessories aficionado @25Honda shared with @AcuraConnected on Instagram his latest DIY refresh on his luxury crossover by deleting the Power Plenum grille (A.K.A. the beak) and replacing it with Acura’s current diamond pentagon-style grille.

Check out his updated ZDX below and scroll left for a front 3/4th view.

With few details, I’m not sure if this is a photoshop or not, but, with another side-angle, it looks to be the real deal. If so, it looks like he carved out a space in his original ZDX’s grille and grafted in the arguably better looking pattern from Acura’s current grille design from another Acura.

Here’s what the original ZDX looks like.

As a refresher, the original ZDX grille was called the Power Plenum by Acura. To everyone else, it was lovingly referred to as Acura’s beak-looking shield. Introduced on a concept vehicle in 2006 and put into production first on the Acura RL and TL before making its way to the MDX and RDX, the power plenum design theme set Acura apart from its competitors.

Although Acura’s moved on from the beak, the power plenum still lives on if you look at the second generation NSX, a car that was introduced just as the power plenum was being phased out.

Today, the plenum is color-matched, but was chrome when first introduced in 2016.

I think the Power Plenum looked best on the ZDX, befitting of its “ahead of its time” styling. Not too large and proportionally sized, the beak flowed well with the rest of the ZDX’s design language. A shame they only sold the ZDX for three model years before being discontinued thanks to poor sales.

This modern re-interpretation of the ZDX front freshens the ZDX up, keeping it inline with the rest of Acura’s lineup.But, like one commenter stated in the Instagram post, without the beak, it blends in with the rest of the crossovers out there.