Dochaki Blade - A Custom Cafe Racer Made From Yamaha RXZ

Article by Anupam Singh Parihar, Dochaki Customs, Pune

Dochaki Blade - A Custom Cafe Racer made from Yamaha RXZ

It was a Yamaha RXZ 4-speed, successor of RX Series. In its glory days this particular bike had a long and powerful riding time under its belt. But from past 6 years it was stationary, kind of in a coma. So the owner, who happens to be a good friend of mine, told me that he wants to bring this beast out of the long sleep. He asked us to build a cafe racer, as he has car for his family now, so he can have a single seat motorcycle and nobody will say anything ;-).

So we hired a Tempo, brought this beast to our shop and started making some rough sketches. As we said we wanted to keep it simple. with all the cafe racer features, like long sleek, straight line riding stance. We started with hand sketching and moving on to Photoshop renderings, to create the bike in the virtual world before picking up the grinding wheel.

Photoshop Rendering of the Blade

Once that was done we turned our focus on Panel beating, all the panels including petrol tank, side panel, seat cowl, mudguards, seat pan is hand crafted.We spent a lot of time trying to balance clean graphics with highly complex surfacing, to achieve a clean yet interesting design.

The RXZ's frame has been modified to create a strong top line that flows from headlight to rear cowl.

The forks have been overhauled and fitted with all black. The engine of the RXZ was not working, so the engine has been fully rebuilt and we added some extra horses, by first stage porting, playing with chain sprockets, head, valves etc. Don't know in number how much we have increased but it definitely feels different.

Stripped down Yamaha RXZ - the Blade in the making

As its a Yamaha RX Series, and everybody loves the sound of the exhaust note, we decided not to change it, so we kept the original exhaust intact, just changing its position a bit to fit the design lines of the bike.

The cowl houses the hidden tail light to give it a more cleaner look. Instead of going for clip on handle bars, we opted for Clubman style Handle bars, to make the cafe little bit more comfortable. and make it sleeker look in front also.

Top view of the Blade

Both front and rear 18" tires have been beefed up for better road control and more earthy feeling to the whole bike. To highlight the sleek appearance of the panels, the complete bike is painted in silver with some orange pinstripes.

When we finished the paint and assembled the bike, the client said it looks like a "Blade" with silver over the top line and and black shadowing the lower parts. And this is how the bike got its name from its owner.

Dochaki Blade - A Custom Cafe Racer made from Yamaha RXZ

Lots of minor details has been worked out, like a rectangular speedo to go along with the overall rectangular shapes of the bike, rearward foot pegs and controls for leaned sitting posture, Brown Artificial leather hand made Seat and handle grips, Bar end mirrors, and lot many things.