The project began back in 2016 when i was frantically searching for a cb750, I had no plans to make a cafe racer out of it, just loved the model as it is. I found the 1977 cb750 Supersport which was a runner but was in poor conditions with most of the fittings either broken or covered in surface rust. Eitherway, I drove her around for a while until i decided to do something with it.
I absolutely adored the cafe racer look of the CB but was very cautious about doing something to it since, as I previously stated, we only have about 10-12 CB750s in the entire country and with imports banned, the last of their breed. So for a year, I hopped between the idea of a stock restoration or a cafe racer rebuild. I decided stock restoration would cost too much due to the poor rupee-dollar exchange rate and set out to have it custom built. The biggest 2 problems were, who was to do the job and how were they to do it, since this would be the first CB750 undergoing a restomod in the country.
I chose Zeeshan motorsports in Karachi to do the job due to their exquisite attention to detail and their experience with big japanese 4 cylinder bikes, although Karachi is 1,000 miles away from Islamabad where I live. The plan was to regularly visit and keep updated with the project. I researched cowl designs and proportions and finally designed the existing set up using my horrible Photoshop skills. (hehe, pictures attached). Regardless, ZMS showed their amazing workmanship by hand beating the cowl out to the exact same proportions as advertised. The golden ratio is used to achieve the perfect balance of tank, seat and cowl. The idea setting was the tank being 23 inches with seat and cowl reducing by 1.618 consecutively. the final approximate proportions were tank ~23 inches, the seat 14-14.5 inches and the cowl ~8-9 inches which were replicated to almost exact. Further, a Bikeexif how to article inspired me about angles which i made sure were all perfectly replicated (the angle of the headers to frame, the angle of the muffler to seat etc).
Further, once the cowl had been made, i made sure that the paint scheme was such that would enhance the flat free-flowing design with straight lines to accentuate the shape of the flat frame, and the corresponding flat stainless steel muffler. This is visible in the coach lines which were hand painted by an expert craftsman to make sure that the entire bike was enclosed completely in one cohesive paint theme. The colours were selected were based on enhancing the engine which is the heart of the bike, therefore the frame and wheels were painted black and the tank and cowl were painted a deep blue representing the night sky contrasted with charcoal gray and the coach lines were selected as gold to make the colours ‘pop’. The darker tank, cowl, frame and wheels made the shiny silver engine ‘pop’ and encapsulate the definition of a fast, sleek design that looked like the bike was in motion while standing stationery.
The frame at the back is unmodified and still has its original seat hoop, however, it has been de-tabbed to give it that smooth and sleek look.
In the performance modification section, the bike was given a complete engine overhaul and fitted with a Barnett racing clutch. The rubber on the tires comes from Malaysia from a brand called Swallow that i was introduced to by Azhar from Kerkus in Kuala Lumpur who has been an excellent help in the overall build. The bike was fitted with a 4400 Lumens headlight and aftermarket tail light and blinkers. The sidewinder exhaust was custom made in Pakistan with a stainless steel muffler to give it an exhaust note worthy of the name. All new wiring was made customized to ensure that the Yuasa 9A battery worked wonderfully. A very interesting bit of the bike is the starting mechanism which has an aircraft style toggle switch for the kill switch and sleek starter button right on top of the triple tree which makes starting her a joy every time! Tuning the carburetors was a challenge so we built a custom airbox and mounted a single pod filter and switched to CDI ignition to make starting and riding more reliable.
The bike was built on a budget so we couldn’t unfortunately fit high-end gadgetry such as the M-unit items, but that doesn’t rule out future upgrades! All-in-all, we are all extremely proud of the way she turned out especially with the limited knowledge and budget we set out on. A build sheet of all major upgrades is added herewith, the actual list is too long to quote! All items, apart from the original frame and wheels are new right down to the entire motorcycle being held together by stainless steel allen keys to ensure that no part of the bike looked sub-international standard!
The cafe racer culture is just starting here in Pakistan with most bikes being based on single cylinders and with no one venturing into the complicated world of big 4 cylinders, the experience was nothing short of extraordinary.