Modifying Frame for Cafe Racer Look

thefish

Been Around the Block
Hey guys, I just landed my first project - 1983 Kawasaki 750 LTD. Similar story to others - it's awesome, garage kept and has low mileage. Only 2,200!!

I want to turn it into a café racer styled bike but it's built like a cruiser. What suggestions would you give? I need to modify the frame a good bit I imagine. I am no welder. How much would it cost to have the low sitting frame be brought up to match that classic café racer style where the tank and seat are horizontally aligned?
Also, what other things would need to be taken into consideration when doing this?

Thanks!

Pics to come soon
 
thefish said:
Hey guys, I just landed my first project - 1983 Kawasaki 750 LTD. Similar story to others - it's awesome, garage kept and has low mileage. Only 2,200!!

I want to turn it into a café racer styled bike but it's built like a cruiser. What suggestions would you give? I need to modify the frame a good bit I imagine. I am no welder. How much would it cost to have the low sitting frame be brought up to match that classic café racer style where the tank and seat are horizontally aligned?
Also, what other things would need to be taken into consideration when doing this?

Thanks!

Pics to come soon




It takes a shit ton of work to mod an LTD style frame to a cafe-ish style. They are far more suited to a bobber style with their geometry. You can do a cafe with one but the frame mods will be your big challenge and unless done right, will never quite look the part. This is my opinion. It can be done, just don't underestimate what it will take to get there. I have a KZ750 "ltd, ie..jap cruiser" style. It's just not the best candidate for a "cafe".. With all that said, go for it. Lets see what you got... :)
 
canyoncarver said:
It takes a shit ton of work to mod an LTD style frame to a cafe-ish style. It's just not the best candidate for a "cafe".. With all that said, go for it. Lets see what you got... :)

Uh heck no let's not see what I got haha this is my first "build". I wasn't sure if it'd be crazy tough or not.
 
canyoncarver said:
I have a KZ750 "ltd, ie..jap cruiser" style.

Anywhere where I can check out what you did with yours? I'm curious and want to get as many ideas as I can.
Also, I've been told that clip-on handlebars and/or clubman style handlebars won't really work for my bike. Any truth to this?

Thanks!!
 
thefish said:
Anywhere where I can check out what you did with yours? I'm curious and want to get as many ideas as I can.
Also, I've been told that clip-on handlebars and/or clubman style handlebars won't really work for my bike. Any truth to this?
Thanks!!


I don't have a thread for that bike but I'm doing a cafe on a KZ with a more standard frame, it's stalled at the moment but will keep moving over the winter. It's in my .sig.

Low bars like clip-ons or clubmans and stock pegs are pretty uncomfortable (unless you are a circus performer or very short.) and don't usually look right either IMHO, I've tried it as well as many others on the forums. A few will like it and stick with it but most agree it's not nice to your body. Those type bars are much better if you relocate the foot controls to a lower and more rearward spot on the bike. This involves fabrication work and re-rigging the shift and brake linkages.


disclaimer: I'm certainly not trying to get you to change your mind or direction on the bike just offering up opinions/advice which are worth what you are paying for them. ;)
 
canyoncarver said:
disclaimer: I'm certainly not trying to get you to change your mind or direction on the bike just offering up opinions/advice which are worth what you are paying for them. ;)

No worries! This is much needed. I want to do it right. I don't want a deranged looking bike. Now I see why old Honda CBs are so popular on this site. I'm a newbie to this.

So clip-ons and clubmans are pretty much only good for café racers? Which handlebars would recommend for my build? Also, any ideas for cool seating?
 
canyoncarver said:
Post some decent pics of the bike and let's see what you are working with.

Will do, unfortunately I'm on my work computer and they don't take kindly to "top secret" documents being uploaded and sent out for the world to see.
 
Sell that bike and get a more appropriate model to begin with. What you want to accomplish would take skill with a welder. You would be better served with a frame that's better suited to the style you have in mind.


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540Nova said:
Sell that bike and get a more appropriate model to begin with. What you want to accomplish would take skill with a welder. You would be better served with a frame that's better suited to the style you have in mind.


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yeah, a part of me agrees with you about selling it for something that would work better... but my girlfriend's dad gave it to me. Granted, he was gonna give it away anyways but I'd like to see this one through.

I'll post pics of my bike and bikes that I'm using as inspiration to see if anyone has any ideas
 
Just an FYI. Voodoo Vintage makes a weld on hardtail kit for your bike if you wanna go legit on the chop/bob style. Not necessary but I've been eyeballing them myself and may take the plunge and order one for my KZ750 bob/chop.


All the style stuff aside, is the bike running? You mentioned garage kept, low miles etc but when old bikes sit, they need TLC.
 
Cruiser style bikes are indeed perhaps not the best starting point for a cafe style build. However, it depends on how much fabrication work and experience you have. If your are really determined I think that is more important than how much skill and experience you have. Determination is what gives everyone skills and experience. You have two issues to solve in addition to all the things you would have to to on a more suitable starting platform. Cruiser style bikes generally have two distinct differences from their racier cousins: Low seat height and visually a longer and taller front end. If you can figure out how to "fix" these two things, then this platform becomes much the same as any other depending on the scope and scale of your intentions.

Fixing the seat height can be relatively simple as in simply adding structure to what you have. Alternatively, you can cut off what you have and fabricate a new "subframe" to replace it with. That is a big job for most people, but not terribly complicated and you likely won't get into too deep water engineering wise as long as you keep the rear shock length and mounting positions the same.

Altering the front end is another story entirely. To watch the internet, you'd think swapping out your front end was a no brainer. In reality it is anything but. Mechanically it isn't too bad, but even seemingly small changes can have a large impact on how your bike handles. On your 750, the engineers have done some things to fool your eye into thinking the front fork is longer and more steeply raked than it actually is. The lower fork legs are over long and extend below the axle. Mechanically, they are not all that much longer than a "normal" bike but the appearance is enhanced with the unneeded extra length. The rake is only a bit larger than normal, and the front axle is mounted in front of the fork legs to bring the trail back into a reasonable range. You can certainly and potentially fairly simply change the front end to suit, but it is important to understand what you want first, and make educated intentional choices. You likely are going to want steeper steering geometry and lower the front of the bike a bit. The way to start is to measure what you have first, rake, trail, fork offset, (really axle offset), and tire outside diameter. A little research will tell you what values for rake and trail are typical for sport bikes touring bikes, cruisers etc. Then when you consider making a change, say lowering the height if the steering stem, you will be able to generate what the new values will be and make a rational decision on what to do. There are plenty of on line calculators that let you plug in your bikes dimensions (or intended dimensions) and get the result. This will keep you in the ballpark of where you want to be and give you a pretty good shot of ending up with a decent handling motorcycle. Alternatively, you can guess (lots of people do with wildly varying results!). If this is more than you think you are up to, you likely will be better served to leave the front end engineering alone.

But don't despair! If your main focus is how it looks, you can do a great deal without redesigning the mechanics of your bike. Find a tank that is longer and less teardrop shaped and see what it will take to mount on the bike. Lower the bars. Lower the instruments. Kawasaki's designers made these things very high in the front to accentuate a "chopper" look. Choppers handle like shit, so Kawasaki was not able to actually build and sell such a thing. They had to cheat with some clever aesthetic characteristics. If you focus on "undoing" those things, you can then use the same tactic to make the bike look more "cafe" like than its chassis actually is. Since your bike was built high in front, considering clip on's is a lot more reasonable than on a "standard" bike because they won't be nearly as low. Getting all that hardware low will have a huge impact on the overall look without serious permanent alterations.

Whatever you do, ride around on your bike a LOT before you commit to a big plan. You want to be clear on what you want to change. You can take your entire motorcycle apart in a day, but it will take very considerably longer to put back together, so be careful on how big a bite you take!
 
But very few of those are the twin and even less are the hunchback cruiser frame. But is it a twin or a four?

The easiest way is design a structure to take the seat as Mobius mentioned already but the frame is designed to keep the set low, so it might be more suitable as a basis for a Bobber. Search on this site for KZ750s and see what others are doing with them. Khaos is right - use Google to get some ideas, but remember that the LTD forks are not the same as the rest of the range. You can probably swap in a complete KZ650/750/1000 front end though.
 
Yeah, pretty much scraped the café racer route. It's a chopper/bobber and it's going to stay that way. Should look pretty sweet!

Having some trouble removing the rear wheel. It's a shaft drive and the nut just seems to be completely stuck. Won't loosen. Any ideas?
 
yes, 1/2" impact gun or breaker bar......or if you don't have a breaker bar then use a 1/2" ratchet that you don't like with a pipe on the end of it for more leverage
 
Guess I'm gonna have to wear the hell out of my ratchet. Hate to do that but this nut won't come loose.
 
thefish said:
Yeah, pretty much scraped the café racer route. It's a chopper/bobber and it's going to stay that way. Should look pretty sweet!

Having some trouble removing the rear wheel. It's a shaft drive and the nut just seems to be completely stuck. Won't loosen. Any ideas?

I think that is a good choice. If you just wanted to make the bike look like a Cafe then, with a lot of work, you could do it but Cafe's are supposed to be performance bikes and even though we cannot expect the performance of a Cafe-modded older bike to match the performance of a new bike, it should still have a performance character. You can still customise this bike and make it look cool, Bobbers and Choppers are only supposed to look cool anyway. Good luck!
 
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