How to Build A Cafe Bike

AMA announced today That the 2012 vintage motorcycle days at Mid Ohio Raceway will feature Mods and Rockers. Scooters And Cafe Bikes. You don’t want to miss this. Mark your calendar July 20-22 at Mid Ohio.

I had a great time last night meeting the folks from Cincinnati Cafe racers. The Comet host a bike night every Tuesday. If your around Cincinnati Drop in.

I just got my GoPro Hero2 This little camera is awesome.  You will see it in action on upcoming episodes of Cafe Bike.  www.bliptv.com/cafe-bike

A great looking cb350 cafe’ note the use of a cb 200 gas tank.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

See more of this motorcycle on a upcoming episode of Cafe Bike on bliptv.

Cafe Bike is now on Roku streaming tv.

Here’s a clip from the upcoming episode of Cafe Bike.

A clean fuel tank is essential to good performance. If your fuel tank has rust in it you will constantly be battling with clogged fuel filters and carb or injector problems. But how much rust is too much? Many riders think that if the interior surface isn’t covered with crusty rust that their tank is ok but take a look at the photos of the tank off of my cb350 project.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is the fuel that came out of the fuel line!
There is no question any rust is too much rust.

The first episode of Cafe’ Bike is up on Bliptv

bliptv.com/cafe-bike

I traveled to Toledo Ohio yesterday to interview Bill Cox and Paul Walsh.
I first met these guys in the cafe tent at the Vintage Motorcycle Days at Mid Ohio.  It was immediately obvious to me that their passion for their cafe bikes was about a subtle as a forest fire.

The motorcycles are beautiful, but as you listen to the story of how they were built you quickly realize the transformation  is far more than mere cosmetics.

Items like adding dual disk brakes to a stock cb500 fork (this required making caliper pistons and forging special bolts for the right hand side) and making it all look like it came out of the factory that way.  Paul and bill were not satisfied with buying rear sets for their bikes, they designed and built their own right down to the knurled foot pegs.

It was nearly 2:00 AM when I finally got back home but I was still stoked and inspired by these two.

If you are interested in building cafe bikes this is an interview you won’t want to miss.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Who knew Motorcycles were so much work?  Well I guess I did. It’s been a busy couple of days I have set up a fan page on Facebook and we are getting all the stuff finished up with bliptv.com to put the show up. When we go live on bliptv (october) you can find us at bliptv.com/cafe-bike fan page is facebook.com/pages/cafe-bike well I’m off, I have to get to toledo to tape an interview. Jim p.s.  If you know of a cafe bike or builder we should know about have them contact me on this site.