An explanation of these cafe racers.

ibsen22000 wrote:

I mainly posted some facts since this discussion seemed to have gone off topic and gotten rather personal.


There are also examples of factory built café racers. The Triumph Truxton and the Honda GB500 are two examples. The Ducati Sports 1000 Monopost another.

And quite frankly, by using the same logic, none of the japanese built cruisers, starting with the 70's Kawasaki LTD models and the Honda Custom models, hardly qualifies as custom built bikes either since they are all factory builds.

But then again, where do you draw the line? Is it a real café racer (or street fighter) only if you built it in your own garage? Or can a bike like the Kawasaki W650 on the picture below, bought from a company like VD Classic in France be concidered to be a "real" café racer?

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<br><br>Post edited by: ibsen22000, at: 2007/07/25 19:23

that is a cool looking bike!!!!!!!!

At the risk of tossing some gasoline on here, here is an interesting article from Cycle World featuring a XZ9 .

And, why not keep fueling it. There was a Triton in Streetfighters magazine, (supposedly the epitome of cafe racers, though I would disagree, thinking the last DBD34 Goldstar is the ultimate cafe racer "of that era"). A Triton Streetfighter/Cafe Racer!? Featherbed, Preunit Triumph cases, Manx style tanks with late sportbike frontend and 3 spoke wheels. Clipons, fairing...in Streetfighters. The definitions of cafe racer and streetfighter are not carved in stone

Oh man look at all the fun I missed. That's what I get for working on my bike...
I'm not gonna beat the dead horse, I think most people know which way their bike leans. I could care less if you're riding a retro racer or an ass-up gixxer, or anything inbetween for that matter. If it looks more like the former, it's probably a cafe. If it looks more like the latter, well there you go...
One thing tho:

IMO, a quite a few cafe bikes made from '70's and '80's Japanese bikes are built by guys that can't afford (or are not talented enough) to make a modern streetfighter, so the cafe bike made from that Japanese beater is the next best thing for them.

That statement would go just as well for a lot of street fighters I have seen. I don't think it has anything to do with talent, more with aspiration and taste. I betcha a lot of the guys that built halfass streetfighters (assfighters?)could not afford (or are not talented enough) to build a nice cafe. As caffcruiser brought up (I think, but I'm not gonna check), the first incarnation of cafe racers were basically emulations of the race bikes of that time - on a budget. True to that statement, a cafe racer does not depend on a huge amount of "bling". Call that ratty or call it bussiness. I'd rather look at a nicely executed budget special than a chrome dipped mega cycle any day of the week.

Fossil wrote:

And, why not keep fueling it. There was a Triton in Streetfighters magazine, (supposedly the epitome of cafe racers, though I would disagree, thinking the last DBD34 Goldstar is the ultimate cafe racer "of that era"). A Triton Streetfighter/Cafe Racer!? Featherbed, Preunit Triumph cases, Manx style tanks with late sportbike frontend and 3 spoke wheels. Clipons, fairing...in Streetfighters. The definitions of cafe racer and streetfighter are not carved in stone

So now it's a streetfighter because it's got some modern parts?

Well crap! My KZ650 has an acewell DIGITAL speedo/tach! Must be a streetfighter! WOO HOO!!!

BTW: The guy who built that triton is on another forum I frequent, and he's the first one to refer to it as a cafe racer.

caffcruiser wrote:

BTW: The guy who built that triton is on another forum I frequent, and he's the first one to refer to it as a cafe racer.

Pm'd you a little question about that gauge dude!

BTW- anytime anyone asks what "style" a bike I do is- I just tell them it is "custom".