Building a café racer always starts with a passion and a plan. Oscar Axhede from Sweden had a plan to build his own café racer and bought a CB750. But after a while he could not give this bike the styling he was looking for. So he sold the CB750 and bought the younger brother: a Honda CB650 from 1980. This is the result of a 2 year project and he called it “Leatherhead”.
He was looking for a design where “cold” steel and aluminum would meet high quality leather. So for that Oscar bought a whole deerskin which he could use to create that look he was looking for. It’s obvious where the name of this CB650 café racer came from.
The rear seat was one of the biggest challenges for Oscar and it took him 3 tries to get the result he wanted. His goal was to create a seat that was one with the frame.
Another masterpiece are the rear sets. All functions from lever, springs and switches are combined in one clean and fresh design. The rear sets even cover footpegs for a passenger.
The deerskin was big enough to create all kinds of leather details on the bike. He even covered the front forks and levers with it.
The bike is fully restored and rebuilt with a lot of custom and aftermarket parts. For the a clean look he uses a beautiful CNC triple tree.
A brief summary from Oscar:
Hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of hours spent in the garage. Countless nights and weekends trying to figure out how to design this or how to solve that. Milling, painting, electricity, carburetors, cables, bolts and screws. What started two years ago as an idea to build something quickly, instead became a bit of an obsession but now it’s finally over and it rides like a charm! So damn proud of what came out of my garage after all this work. And more than anything, sooo stoked to leave it behind me so I can make room for a new project in my life. Pretty sure it won’t be a motorcycle : )
Well, I hope Oscar changes his mind…
Lowered shocks, so don’t ride over bumps and you will also contact rear tire . No fenders so don’t ride in the rain. Front fender also is a fork brace plus those lousy tires, don’t ever lean going around corners. Rotating mass on those car tires is way too high, will negatively affect acceleration, handling and brakes. You made a good bike worse.
Writer: close off your quotation marks!
You’re right, but sometimes forms goes over function. There are a lot of other things that are not practical, like the leather details on the forks and levers. This is a bike you ride on a sunny sunday, maybe 10 times a year.
Wow! I love that bike. What an effort.