| Author | Message | ||
     Swordsman |
.... can someone PLEASE tell me what the hell a "cafe racer" is? Being a relative noob to the bike scene, I've seen this term tossed around alot, but never found any hint of what it really is. What's a cafe got to do with motorcycles???? ~SM (yeah, yeah, go ahead and laugh!)  | ||
| Gentleman_jon |
Back in the day, English riders gathered at the Ace Cafe in London. Every now and then they would jump on their bikes and have a bit of a race. They favoured English iron of the 60's like Nortons, Triumph and Beezers. They often modified them to look somewhat like road racers of the day. Clipon bars or Clubman's bars were the order of the day, larger racing seats. rear sets, solo seats were cool.The bikes had a very homemade look. This style became know as the "Cafe Racer " look. You had to be there:-) This whole scene has recently been revived, read all about it here: http://www.ace-cafe-london.com/ Hope that helps | ||
| Swordsman |
Well FINALLY! Thanks a bunch Jon! I'll read up on that! ~SM  | ||
| Bcordb3 |
Jon, Good one, you failed to mention "the ton". No worries, it is all explained in the Ace site. Went by the local Triumph dealer the other day and took a look at the new Thruxton. That had Ace written all over it. And all these years I thought the Thruxton was a Velocette. Cliff be sure to look at the bike pictures. Hundreds of fine looking cafe racers to be seen. | ||
| Bob_thompson |
Cliff, here's two examples of my cafe racers from the 60's. A turboed 350 Honda 4 and a HD Sportster 86 cu.in. I too liked to be a little different. The cafe racer crowd is still around as you will see with some more posts from others of their examples. Isn't that one reason we ride Buell's.   | ||
| Gentleman_jon |
Bill, Many old timers, think that real Thruxton's were in fact made by Veloce Ltd. Here is a nice drawing of a 67 Velocette Thuxton 500, The last British bike I ever owned.  If memory serves, Erik Buell was a Velocette enthusiast himself. | ||
| Elf |
DROOL....  If you like this, go to:http://www.caferacer.net (Message edited by elf on August 18, 2006) | ||
| Xring |
Yummy! I'm looking at the new Triumphs as a second bike even now. Bill | ||
| Thespive |
I ride with a bunch of Cafe Sporty owners, check out the cafe_sportsters group on Yahoo for some awesome pictures. I have a cafe/hot rod style '04. Its funny, I have clip-ons on my cruiser and bars on my sport bike.   --Sean | ||
| Vaneo1 |
I got a good laugh... however, I learned how to recognize cafe racers by their distinctive look, but never really bothered to aske where the term was coined. | ||
| Johnnylunchbox |
This is a cool sportster cafe racer site... http://www.earth2us.com/bike/index.htm | ||
| Thespive |
That's Ed in Tracy, Ca's site, he is one of our cafe group guys. --Sean | ||
| Johnnylunchbox |
Sean, cool. Let him know I love his site and drool over the bikes on there regularly. | ||
| Gentleman_jon |
Then again, There is absolutely no reason why an innocent XB couldn't be turned into a sincere cafe racer if a person were of that turn mind.  | ||
| Rocketman |
Bob, your old Honda Four looks bloody great....for a Honda. Just to add a little more to the origins of 'cafe racer'. It wasn't specifically the Ace that started the scene. In the late 50's and early 60's there were no Motorways in the UK. The first, the M1, was opened in 1966 and it was but a short section from London to Bedford. Incidentally back then there was no speed limit in force and Aston Martin were well known for carrying out high speed tests on the M1. Hard to imagine now. Well back then the trucks of the time were not capable of the speeds of modern trucks and the roads, even the major trunk roads, had at some point very tight and twisting bends to negotiate. Most early 20th century roads were constructed to go around obstacles rather than cut through the most direct route given the expense and the technology involved in doing so. That meant the truck drivers journey was often long and tiring and they often needed to take breaks, thus the transport cafes littered the roads far and wide. A quick burn up any trunk road on your Brit iron would most likely involve a stop at a favourable cafe were Rockers would gather for the usual, and a cup of hot coffee. I'm not that old, but those were the days. Rocket | ||
| Bake |
 | ||
| Diablobrian |
Cool Bake! Laverda? | ||
| Bake |
Yup, bought it new 32 years ago, hope to keep my Buell that long.  (Message edited by bake on August 19, 2006) | ||
| Captainxb |
Bake, can I be in your will?  But you need a Davida retro helmet for the 'look'. |
