Cosmic Café: Yamaha XS650 Café Racer

Space-Gray Café from MacVittie Motorcycles… 

Over the years, the Yamaha XS650 has earned a tongue-in-cheek nickname as “The Best British Bike Never Built.” Introduced in 1969, this Japanese parallel-twin owed much to the style and charm of the BSA, Norton, and Triumph twins of the previous generation. However, Yamaha’s new SOHC 650 was oiltight, with a horizontally-split crankcase and unit construction. At the time, everything else in the class was either pre-unit (separate engine and gearbox) or unit construction with a vertically-split crankcase, making the XS650 quite a step into the future.

The XS650 quickly earned a reputation for performance, with Kenny Roberts sliding around dirt ovals on his XS-based flat tracker, and it proved itself affordable and reliable for regular riders, too. Today, the XS650 stands as one of the best vintage Japanese motorcycles of the era, and a ready donor for all kinds of custom builds.

Our new friend Matt MacVittie of Asheville, North Carolina’s MacVittie Motorcycles is an engineer and family man who builds “rolling works of mobile art” out of his home garage, doing 100% of the work himself. Regular readers will remember Matt from his “Sapphire” CB550 and “Mint Chip” CB350 we recently featured.

Now he’s back with the glorious XS650 cafe racer you see here:

“This is my 8th build and a personal favorite of mine right now. It is a 1974 Yamaha XS650 named ‘Cosmic.’ This project also came in a bunch of boxes and the subframe was mangled. It then became clear I was going to have to do some sort of monoshock build (not an easy task with the XS650 frame).”

We know Matt has the engineering and fabrication skills to pull off such a conversion, as we saw in his “Mint Chip” build. He modified the rear subframe for a custom monoshock from Hyper Pro Racing and custom-made a steel seat pan / cowl to fit perfectly for this specific build.

“I hid the tail light and blinkers neatly behind the cowl… I custom made some rearset brackets and modified a stainless exhaust to fit.”

Up front, that gorgeous hub is a 1972 Suzuki GT750 4LS unit, which Matt converted to hydraulic. If you’re going to run drums, this is how to do it.

“This gives a modern feel to an absolutely beautiful front brake hub.”

The forks are running custom external dampening springs, and Matt repurposed an old pair of Honda fork covers to house the blinkers and hide the wiring. The headlight is an old Harley unit for which he made a custom bracket.

The tank is one of our favorites of the 1970s, an XS750 unit whose lines really lend themselves to a café build. However, it’s no straight swap, and Matt had to modify the frame to fit the much larger tank and hide all of the electricals beneath it.

Too often, today’s café builds leave out any real work on the motor, which seems antithetical to the aims of such a project. That certainly isn’t the case here:

“This particular build received a full motor rebuild with a 277 degree crank and cam modification to minimize vibrations and give a whole new feel to the ride.”

The engine was rephased from 360º (both piston rods at the same position on the crank) to 277º (rods at 12 and 9 o’clock), which is known to smooth out vibration at high rpm and give the syncopated sound more characteristic of an 83º or 90º V-twin.

Other highlights include a hydraulic clutch conversion, VAPE electronic ignition, and the metallic space gray color that gives the bike its “Cosmic” nickname. While Matt’s two previous builds have gone off to new owners, this XS650 is staying put.

“I don’t think I will ever be able to sell this one.”

Neither would we, Matt! Bravo on yet another sweet build. We look forward to seeing what you wheel out of your garage next.

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