Cafe Racer Before & After

Check out these before and after shots sent to us by Philipp Dewies. He’s a 23year old mechanical engineering student at RWTH Aachen University in Germany. He got some great practical experience in his field while working on this Cafe Racer project with his dad.  The idea to build a Cafe Racer was born out of necessity. Philipp says that he didn’t have enough money to buy a cool bike from a dealer.

He bought what he calls “a cheap” BMW R65 and started to unscrew the whole bike.  He and his dad built new parts, fixed problems and enjoyed the time together in their garage. They had so  much fun, they decided to build another one, a better one. They bought the 1985 BMW R80 RT you see pictured above. They worked on it every weekend for about nine months in their home garage.

“My dad and I were in scale modelling for many years, so we had all the tools we needed already at home,” Philipp told us.

The paint is the original Porsche Aetna Blau from the legendary 1960 Porsche 356B. They integrated a Motogadget Tiny Speedster in the lamp body, powder coated the engine, and many other parts. For the perfect clean shape of the seat they decided to put on a very small Kellermann indicator/backlight combination. He used the leather from the seat to cover the handles. The helmet was painted also in the Porsche Blau. Philipp grinded it in spots to get a cool design. Then he put a clear lacquer on it. The helmet makes a great touch. Tell us what you think. If you have a project you’d like to show, just send it to us through this Contact Us form .