Cafe Racer Discussion

Why would anyone need an excuse to build a bike the way you want it.
"Cafe racer" might not be the best term to classify this style of mods but I can't see a better one. If you think about what a cafe racer is, it is a raod bike that has been stripped down of non essentials and used to time trial race from point A to point B, just because it happened in the 60's and 70's in the UK doen't mean you can't do the same to any bike. Also to categorize a trend into a singal decade is a bit naive.

I have to say your idea of what can and can't be a cafe racer is quite close minded.

I would also venture a guess that my little project spawned this topic. All i have to say is that sucks to be you if it pisses you off. I'm sure when i sell my bike (to get a bubble head BMW) the new owner will enjoy it as is or laugh at all the dumb mods i did, either way i enjoyed doing it and riding it.


I toatly agree with cooter on this

 

LOL

This thread reminds me of the "Definition of a Streetfighter...." threads that appear every 6 months or so on fighter sites. They go for about 12 pages with everyone arguing back and forth until everyone wishes they never posted anything in the first place :lol:

 

A "Cafe' Racer" is more about the MAN than it is the BIKE.
The MAN needed a Bike that would start, run great and not lose time because of too much weight.

But, the term is more about the Rider and his riding prowess than about the lean, "Not needed - not-on-it" bike they rode to become local heroes!
. . . . . . . .
1958 ~ 1961
London

"A café racer, originally pronounced "caff" (as in Kaff) racer, is a type of motorcycle as well as a type of motorcyclist. Both meanings have their roots in the 1960s British counterculture group the Rockers or the Ton Up Club, although they were also common in Italy, Germany, and other European countries.
Rockers were a young and rebellious Rock and Roll counterculture that wanted a fast, personalized and distinctive bike to travel between transport cafés, along the newly built arterial motorways, in and around British towns and cities.

The goal of many was to be able to reach 100 miles per hour (called simply "the ton") along such a route, where the rider would leave from a cafe, race to a predetermined point, and back to the cafe before a single song could play on the jukebox, called record-racing.

They are remembered as being especially fond of Rockabilly music and their image is now embedded in today's rockabilly culture.

A classic example of this was to race from the Ace Cafe on The North Circular road in NW London to the Hanger Lane junction as it then was - it is now the more famous Hanger Lane Gyratory System - and back again.

The challenge was for YOU to ride to the loop and get back to the Ace Cafe before the record YOU just played on the jukebox had ended!!! Given that some of the Eddie Cochran tunes that were in vogue at this time were less than 2 minutes long, the racers would have had to traverse the three miles round trip at extremely high speeds.

 

Whoa! I'm back!

I see where you're all coming from, and I totally support the idea of customization of motorcycles. I just wanted this opinion brought up and made known.

Xulf, your bike is beautiful man. Phenomenal, in fact. If you were the only kind of thing that is ever posted, I wouldn't ever have said anything... I think your bike is as close as anyone will ever get to turning an XJ into a "cafe". I just wanted to make a voice known in the XJ community that everyone chopping up their bikes to make cafe racers doesn't make the community look better. It doesn't make the bikes look better. And it cheapens the term "cafe racer". It makes it so anyone could put on clubmans and a tail and call it one.

I just wanted to make the point. I'm not saying it can't be replicated. I'm not saying that it's never done well (because I can could 3 times that it has been done well). I'm just saying it is a point that needs to be recognized by a lot of people here. And I know the 60s were the true cafe's, but no one can find 60s british bikes anymore and I find the 70s Japanese bikes a fine substitute for the every day man. I just think the 80s brought on a different era of frames, and a different era of creature comforts, weight, and style.

Cheers, guys. Good luck building. Just wanted to hear some conversation on the subject, as I think preserving the history is important, just as in anything. So many art forms and pure acts get ruined now days. You just see bullshit everywhere where there should be purity. But then again, I guess it doesn't matter.

 

Well, I guess it is a good thing you aren't in charge of how everyone builds their bikes, then. Because if you were, Cafe bikes would never have come into being in the first place.


You know, "purity" and all. Everyone would ride whatever the manufacturers produced. No mods whatsoever. MmmmmMmmmm. What a beautiful world that would be. Conformity rawks. Especially when it is imposed by someone on an intraweb forum who has decided he should never see things he doesn't personally find appealing.

Like I said, there are plenty of bikes I find ugly, in my personal opinion. But it is just that. My personal opinion. And I would never impose it on someone else's creativity.

 

I never said "conformity rawks". If you think I said that, you're missing my point...

There aren't a lot of XJs left and we all love them. All I'm saying is that if you're going to radically change one, you better make sure you know what you want out of it and make sure that you aren't bastardizing it into something it will never be. You can call that "conformity rawks" if you want, but that isn't what I'm saying.

Also, I wouldn't call most of the "cafe racer" mods i see creativity. We could all tell everyone that their cafe mods are perfect and make comments like "keep up the good work!" and everyone could chop their bikes and we could all be happy, or we could have an expectation of quality in the XJ community. It's your choice.

P.S. I have clubmans on my bike and hate the square headlight and atari box, hoping to get rid of them in time. Hence: anti-modification isn't what I'm saying. Just saying, lets have expectations.

 

So you're hooked up on semantics then?

Just because we modify it to look like, handle, and feel like a cafe racer, it can't be called one, just because it's the "wrong" bike to make into one?

So only british bikes are cafe racers. got it.

You're pretty hard on people who are chopping the frame of a fairly forgettable bike. the XJ bike, while odd and good at what it did, is more of a platform to be something special, than a good bike on its own. Besides, there are plenty of XJ's in the world. PLENTY.

It's like someone screaming about someone else turning a 53 bel air into a funny car. There are PLENTY more.

 

Tend to share the same tastes as bigfitz52 in that stock or pretty close to original tends to be what floats my boat.For various reasons but mostly because standards exist because they do everything well not perfectly but acceptable compromise FOR MOST PEOPLE.
Having said that some people build what suits them from basic raw material and some do a great job.Most modern custom stuff is a rehash of what used to be but the reason why is forgotten.Or its just a plain old wank.
But people do things like albuquerquechopper http://xjbikes.com/Forums/viewtopic/t=13972.html and in my opinion its magic and probably his as well.Then there is painterD's bike http://xjbikes.com/Forums/viewtopic/p=1 ... tml#151016 nice clean practical ride that looks like his bike no one else's.
Eases bike looks great http://xjbikes.com/Forums/viewtopic/t=3 ... art=0.html and xulf13's looks great as well http://xjbikes.com/coppermine/displayim ... pos=1.html
But it doesn't really matter what I think they weren't built for me and as far as chopping them up because there are plenty around ,they run out fast when every body starts chopping.
The old argument about cafe racer vs streetfighter is a waste of time because they are pretty much the same thing done by different generations just that streetfighters are the contemporary version different materials and slightly different purpose.
I think this discussion is about taste more than anything else but still always fun!
There is more I'd like to say but when you type with 2 fingers it takes too d#*n long.

 

You won't be getting an XJ to handle like a cafe racer. You can make it look like one cosmetically, you may improve the handling, but that's about it.

Seriously, the XJ is pretty close to the top of the list of bikes that would NOT make a good cafe donor IMO. Shaft drive, 4 cyl, overweight, conservative steering geometry....and the Maxims are even less suited....

I love XJ's for their durability and no fuss (sometimes surprising) performance / capability....but to try and make a cafe racer out of one would be an exercise in form over function....which is the exact opposite of what a cafe racer should be.

 

Alright, you got me there. Shafties don't make high performance cafe bikes, haha.


I guess I should have mentioned the steering and stance, instead of "handling"

But in theory, I should be able to shave a damn good bit of weight off of my bike. I don't need a center stand, anti dive forks, engine guards, the atari and complex brake system, TWO headlights, and god knows how much useless wiring and metal there is to trim...

But I definitely feel you on the 4 cylinder front. For me, I just think small v twins or inline twins/thumpers are the way to go.

Ideally I will get my bike down to mearly this amount of metal.

 

How's this? The factory book says 407lb., the goofy "Cafe" fairing it came with weighed a lot more than 7lb.



Remember, not ALL XJ's are poor-handling, complicated, overweight shaft-drive clunkers...

I could put even lower bars on it, I guess, but then it wouldn't be as comfortable. And as far as handling, with updated suspension components the 550 Seca is a lot better than a goodly percentage of the old Britbikes, honest.

 

And since we're on the subject, I took a tape measure out to the garage.

The 4-cylinder Seca 550 motor is a whopping ONE INCH wider than my Norton's old "narrow" parallel twin.

Another interesting item: If I wanted to gain enough ground clearance on the Norton to get the lean angles possible with the completely stock 550 Seca, I'd have to remove its centerstand.

Don't get me wrong; I love the Cafe "look" and have been a lifelong fan of British twins. However, I like to RIDE my motorcycle, a lot. And there is such a thing as progress, although too much of it isn't necessarily a good thing. Turn-key reliability and smoothness, yes; plastic bodywork and thin seats, no. Which is why I like the early XJs so much.

As far as low bars and rearsets go, yes, they look cool. And they do have a certain advantage if you're riding fast over short distances. But spend 3, 4 or 7 hours in the saddle and then let's talk. I used to swap from "euro touring" bars to clubmans on my SR500 for a weekend of romping, and then switch back before the workweek commute. Long-distance comfortable, they ain't.

 

So now it's... "over weight shaft-drive clunkers"...hhrrrrmmph.. Better not take the 'ole bag for a coffee then.

 

Bigfitz beat me to the handling.
Shaft drive cafe racer http://www.allenmotorsports.com/mv750_sport_america.htm

 

Yes the MV 750 was a pretty machine, but it was competing with the Z1 and the CB750 at the time...... and it came third..... :cry:

 

To PipeDream, what bikes would consider to good cafe racers?

 

http://www.xjbikes.com/Forums/viewtopic ... irago.html

Just digging up the "Spanish Cafe" with Virago spokes and hidden battery for everyone's enjoyment.

So is my Seca 900 a "cafe" since it has a lighter performance exhaust, smaller turn signals, holes in the airbox, lighter foam grips, Kevlar brake pads, or is a funny looking seat mandatory ??

 

You could also do a chain driver conversion on it which I would expect most of those that were raced would have, it was done as a factory option

 

Factory option?? Wow - gotta say I've never seen one 8O

 

Of course the true cafe's were the tritons and other british bikes of the era. But for practicality of ownership, I believe that the hondas, kawasakis, suzukis and yamahas that came over in the early 70's are fine substitutes.

Light bikes, good handling, aggressive stance... before the days of more complex machinery. There is a reason why those bikes are still raced today through organizations like the AHRMA and WERA. It's because they made great race bikes.

Who do you know that track races Secas? Do you think anyone will in 10 years? Ever? No. They aren't made for it!

Any "cafe" conversion done to one is almost always purely cosmetic... and that's fine but I don't want it to become any more of a lame fad than it already is. No reason to chop good bikes to follow the mold of what everyone thinks is cool. Especially when what you end up with is a heavy sport tourer dressed up like a race bike for halloween.