Kawasaki KZ440 Cafe Racer by Slyfox Customs

Nigel Fox is one of those guys with a skill set to die for. Together with his dad he worked with motorized wheels his entire life as a hobby. Usual he works with four-wheelers but he got his hands on this 1986 Kawasaki KZ440 he bought from a friend who lost his interest in the project.

He had no clear idea what to do with the bike, but he simply started stripping the bike down. An English wheel and some youthful enthusiasm quickly got this project running. It consumed all his spare time since he did everything on this bike himself. 

Nigel started on the tail section, “rolling the hump on my English wheel”. This resulted in a professional looking cafe racer seat and cowl with two integrated LED lights. He placed clip ons on the stock fork and in order to keep clearance, he had to improvise and created two dents up front.

To keep the bike “sly”, he fabricated a lot of parts like the front mud guard, chain guard, rear sets and a range of brackets for the license plate speed and some smaller items. To get this oldie back in shape, he overhauled the engine from gearbox to heads, rejetted the carburetors and created a complete new wiring loom. The battery and key barrel are hidden in the tail section. To give the twin cylinder engine some sound, Nigel also fabricated the exhausts himself.

To finish it, he painted the bike in candy orange with gun metal gray on the frame and wheels.

The result is a bike which is “sly as a fox”. Great to see what a single guy with a lot of passion (and some skills) can do. I’m looking forward to a new project of Nigel!

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Photo’s by Chris Sweetapple