Is any production bike a true Cafe?

So here is the deal...how can a production bike be a Cafe?
The whole point of the Cafe was that people built and modified street bikes to emulate a race bike.
So a company can't manufacture a Cafe bike . It's just another sport bike.
This is a reaction to that BMW 6 concept "cafe" bike.
Puleeeeese!!!!!!
If it ain't old it ain't a Cafe 8)

Good luck getting a hard definition of this. I'm not gonna argue but I think the best description is what you think it is. Looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, etc.

ive always hated the terms cafe bike and cafe racer. its silly. do any of us meet up at cafes and then race as they did in the 60s? how many of us are riding something thats period correct enough to be a "real" cafe bike?

95% of us are on mid-70s+ japanese bikes. many of those have had little to no performance upgrades done beyond weight loss,exhaust, and air pods. "real" cafe bikes were modded extensively using pieces of different bikes in order to go as fast as possible. It could be argued that the vast majority of us in-fact dont ride cafe bikes, we ride vintage bikes styled to look like older "cafe" bikes which were modded to look and perform like the (then) current race bikes.

so now companies start making vintage race styled street bikes and use the term cafe because thats what we as the community that has been making them in the garage has identified them as. much as honda now has a production chopper that hasn't had anything "chopped" and harley has been making bobbers for years that haven't had anything bobbed.

its just a word, a silly one at that. I for one am glad to see these bikes being made. the look good and in 10 or so years theyre going to make great starting points for me. and in 20 or 30 years my kids will fawn al over the rusty remains of them they use to put together their rides.

and as far as

So a company can't manufacture a Cafe bike . It's just another sport bike.

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have you ridden one of each? say a ducati 1098 and a ducati sport classic? or maybe a triumph 675 and a thruxton? notice any difference there? say...i dunno... everything?

and new bikes can certainty be "cafe" bikes. thats just stupid.

I don't know what to call them, but they're cool... I do however, dislike the crowd that throws a sticker and slip on akro exhaust on their bike and calls it custom... these stockey jockeys are sure to invade the builder crowd sooner than later, throwing up post upon post about their new thruxton cafe with the "custom" bars, i.e. they ordered it with the #16a bars instead of the standard. But then again, as someone who makes a living doing this, I can't complain that they're growing in popularity, I think modifying your old bike into something that's unique to you will always be alive and vibrant, our set is as old as motorcycles, no worries.

No. Production cafe racer is an oxymoron, much like factory custom. Just because someone slaps a cafe label onto a bike does not make it cafe. Even though my bike has cafe styling elements, I don't consider it a cafe racer and I never refer to it as one. It's such an overused term now that it's lost it's meaning.

I always thought that cafe racers were what the old race bikes were called and that motorcycle owners would take their stock bikes and "chop" them (hence choppers) in order to make them more like the race bikes. A lot of street bikes back in the day I assume were downgraded versions of their racing counterpart and so owners who wanted the racier version, a cafe racer, would just upgraded the stock bike. All customized motorcycles can be considered "choppers," but as far as I know cafe racer meant the race bikes. So I suppose you could have a production cafe racer considering that most stock sport bikes available today can run circles around the old cafe racers.

All in all it might be one of those "If it quacks like a duck..."

I've always felt that the "cafe' racer" was originally the rider, not the bike. The bike was whatever he had to ride while racing between cafes'. Modified, of course, to win.

Well, a GB500 is certainly a "purpose built" bike, if not a cafe racer.
It sure looks the part, and handles great.

If you look at a lot of the old pictures of rockers and their bikes you will notice half or more are stock bikes with a few things removed, stock seat, drag bars, etc. They were also riding fairly current bikes, they weren't restoring 40 year old motorcycles. Who knows who actually coined the term "cafe racer" but I am betting it started as a derogatory term referring to the kids being wanna be race bike riders.

Ive also spotted a few jap bikes hiding in a few old pictures of the rockers and their bikes. I'd imagine they mostly rode British because that's what they had, if a faster Jap bike could be had for the same price with the same parts availability they probably would have been more common.

I have friends with new bikes and old bikes and I consider some of the new ones, including a new Thruxton, to be cafe racers because they are true to the style and ridden with the same spirit.

I've also seen vintage bikes with clubmans, bum stop seats, open exhausts, and pods that I would not consider cafe racers because they were just slapped together and probably don't perform any better than they did stock.

Chrome wont get you home and clubman bars and pipe wrap don't make your bike any faster! I'd trade my old Honda for a new Triumph any day, they are nice bikes and if it was mine it would be a "cafe racer" because I'd rid it like it is.

As I had hoped when starting this post, there are some interesting points of view being made.
I know a guy who was in the thick of that Ace cafe thing in England and I will ask him what constitutes a "Cafe"
bike or the "Cafe" rider.
I'll let you know.

Uncle Ernie said:

Well, a GB500 is certainly a "purpose built" bike, if not a cafe racer.
It sure looks the part, and handles great.

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+1

What about Bimota.....
http://www.lifeinitaly.com/motorcycle/bimota.asp

Nanahan Man said:

So here is the deal...how can a production bike be a Cafe?
The whole point of the Cafe was that people built and modified street bikes to emulate a race bike.

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You just answered your question. By your definition you are talking about race replica sport bikes. Look around. CBR 600RR-CBR1000RR, R6-R1, ZX6-ZX10R, GSXR 600-GSXR 750-GSXR1000, MV Agusta F4R, Ducati 1198R

Honestly, I don't understand why people get so hung up on the so called true definition of these things. We are building replicas of replicas, for God's sake!

Uncle Ernie said:

Well, a GB500 is certainly a "purpose built" bike, if not a cafe racer.
It sure looks the part, and handles great.

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me too,+1

We are building replicas of replicas, for God's sake!

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Good point.
I'm not hung up about it but threw the question out to get some discussion going.
Worked too ;D

the only reason I will not buy a production "cafe style" bike, ie: Thruxton or Duc Sport Classic, is that they are already done. Beautiful, mind you, but finished. which = no fun for me.
whatever we end up calling the bikes that grace the pages of DTT, it's the imagination, personal efforts, and thrifty innovations by the owner, that make them exciting to me.

thrifty innovations

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I like that better than "I don't have the money..." ;D

Not this again, come guys! I'll let you in on a bit of what I think, I reckon it fits in with the spirit of the whole thing.

Personally, I couldn't give a flying hoot in a mail sack whether somone classifies the bike I'm building as a cafe, a streetfighter, a muscle bike or a tricycle. I'm building it because it'll perform a bit better than stock and, in my opinion, look better as well.

Thats what the ethos of the whole thing is for me.

- boingk

The reason I threw this question out there is not anything to do with what I, or anyone else, calls my bike.
It was more a comment on the MANUFACTURERS calling something a "cafe" because it's a "cool" thing these days and the bike is nothing like a cafe.
Sometimes I thing people respond without really reading the original post.
People get so worked up about some things...sheesh :

the MANUFACTURERS calling something a "cafe" because it's a "cool" thing these days

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You got it in one, bud.

the [manufacturer 'cafe' bikes are] nothing like a cafe.

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Yeah, in many cases you are dead right. I'm just saying that it makes absolutely no difference - people will buy what they like. Some people just want a label thats cool - which cafe apparently is at the moment. I like the muscle bikes of the 70's and 80's, high strung strokers, and things like Triumph Thruxtons. The latter happens to have the lines of a cafe, the former generally don't. That new Beemer 6 you mentioned definitely does not but that doesn't make it a bad bike, just a case of shoddy marketing.

My point is, it really doesn't matter. Some things are called a cafe and you immediately think "Pfft, no its bloody not!", while some are subtly put into that basket with marketing terms like 'nostalgic' and 'classic'. The latter case is the one that generally is true to the original form, and not simply putting it on to cash in.

Cheers - boingk