Last year the Cafe Racer scene was buzzing with the news that Dime City Cycles were building a custom motorcycle to giveaway, the bike they built was this Honda CB750 they named Mabel. Mabel was built by Herm and Jason at Dime City Cycle HQ in Florida and was handed over to a lucky New Yorker by the Iron & Air Magazine team at the 2012 Barber festival. I got in touch with Jason and he gave me the low down on how Mabel the Honda CB750 Cafe Racer came together...
"I could say that the bike selection was due to the fact that the CB750 is the most iconic bike...blah blah blah but who am I kidding! We had about 10 bikes worth of 750 parts here and it just made sense. Plus, Herm and I really wanted to build a 750 as we hadn't done one yet."
As it turns out Mabel is the perfect "how to" template if you're wanting to build your own CB750 Cafe Racer. As Jason went on to tell me, most of the bike was made using bolt on parts from the DCC catalogue so I've taken the liberty of including links through to the DCC store where relevant.
Mabel started out as a rusty old '78 Honda CB750 K that Herm picked up for a bargain. Before anyone could even think about raising an argument for restoration the CB was stripped down to a few buckets of parts and a sorry looking frame. The rear end of the frame was sliced off and replaced with a DCC weld on rear loop to allow for the fitment of a Legendary Motorcycle Thruxton Seat w/ DCC Originals Cushion . The Honda fuel tank was replaced by a Legendary Motorcycles Manx Tank with Monza Cap and was painted along with the seat in a Dime City Cycles red and black paint scheme by Moe Colors. Mabels rims are stock CB units wrapped in fresh Avon rubber but DCC re-laced them with fresh stainless steel spokesbefore powder coating them gloss black along with the detagged and cleaned frame.
Electrics were upgraded with the addition of a Dyna Electronic Ignition, programmed to deliver optimum performance from Mabel's Keihin CR Racing Carbs and Performance Tuned 4-into-1 Exhaust System. Positioning Mabel's rider correctly for Ton Up riding was done by swapping out the CB's stock pegs for DCC Original Rearsets and by replacing the stock bars with DCC "Speed" Bars fitted with Nissin Controls and 2.5″ Mini Gauges. Handling improvements come from front and rear Progressive Suspension with 2″ shorter fork tubes and a 7-way Adjustable Steering Damper to avoid nasty surprises when exiting the twistys. Mabel also features a long list of Dime City Cycle upgrades such as fresh cables and fuel lines, new lighting, velocity stacks, plenty of polishing and some sweet details like a Dime set into the top clamp retaining bolt.
Mabel started out as a rusty old '78 Honda CB750 K that Herm picked up for a bargain. Before anyone could even think about raising an argument for restoration the CB was stripped down to a few buckets of parts and a sorry looking frame. The rear end of the frame was sliced off and replaced with a DCC weld on rear loop to allow for the fitment of a Legendary Motorcycle Thruxton Seat w/ DCC Originals Cushion . The Honda fuel tank was replaced by a Legendary Motorcycles Manx Tank with Monza Cap and was painted along with the seat in a Dime City Cycles red and black paint scheme by Moe Colors. Mabels rims are stock CB units wrapped in fresh Avon rubber but DCC re-laced them with fresh stainless steel spokesbefore powder coating them gloss black along with the detagged and cleaned frame.
"The aim of the Mabel build was to create a bike that had the had the fit and finish of all our high end custom builds using as many off the DCC shelf parts as possible vs. making custom ones. This way we could show our customers what they could build in there own garage. There's nothing majorly complex or difficult on Mabel, the most difficult thing was the rear brake (it's cable drive, not linkage) in the end, we wanted to convey that gorgeous custom builds can be done with off the shelf parts too for those who might not have all the high end fab skills."
"When you encounter that one obnoxious squid on a GSX-R 600, you can merely slide back a tad in the saddle, down-shift a gear or two and leave him in the dust – shocked by the fact that an old classic just ate his modern power ranger cycle for breakfast."
Looking for Cafe Racer parts and accessories? Head to 100MPH.com.au
from return of the cafe racers
