Schlachtwerk’s Tommy Thöring is obsessed with the Kawasaki W650. As everyone should be. They’re dead reliable, have handling so neutral it could be described as ‘Swiss’. If you’re in Germany and you own a Dub you want chopped into something special, it’s Schlachtwerk’s number you’d be calling…

There is something incredibly satisfying about being right, and if you’re part of the cafe racer revival, then by default you are. In the 1990s, some Japanese manufacturers were already selling retro remakes and industry experts thought this to be insane. Now Germany’s Mellow Motorcycles have proven them wrong…

BGM Cafe Racers’ Tonie Wishart is trying to redeem himself. Years ago his father brought a bike home, an old Kawasaki G4TR 100, which Tonie successfully pulled apart and unsuccessfully put back together. Now, years later, Tonie and the team from BGM have turned out this…

They say a journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step; but for one particular German it only makes sense to begin with a Kawasaki W650. Now he’s packing up his Schlachtwerk operation and heading for the Land Down Under. Sydney to be exact…

After almost ten years of blogging about custom bikes, we’re pretty confident we could count the instances of builders who have made their own engines on one hand; even a hand that’d taken a trip through a rear chain and sprocket. Put simply, it almost never happens. Unless your Indonesia’s Pap N Mam…

As modern retros go, Kawasaki hit the nail on the head with their re-imagining of the W series bikes from the ’60s. In fact, the ‘new’ W’s bevel driven twin cylinder engine is even more of a classic than the original. But as an overall package they’ve always needed a little more panache…

The launch of Kawasaki’s new Z900RS has seen the return of some good ol‘ manly retro moto madness. Custom-made for 2018, Japan’s Blue Thunders shop in conjunction with Icon Motosports has taken a brand new Z, made it into a racer and decided to run it up Pikes Peak at 110% just for shits and giggles…

In an industrial area near the wharves, on a white weather beaten wall, is an old Castrol sign that looks like it marks the spot of an old English workshop. Welcome to Hiroshima and the now world famous workshop of custom builder extraordinaire Kengo Kimura…

Insanity comes in many forms. But the best kind of crazy is Tom Thörig from Schlachtwerk, who corralled some of Germany’s finest craftsmen into helping him produce this – an amazing Kawasaki W650 dubbed ‘Wasabi’ that’s built to tackle our favourite race series, the Sultans of Sprint…

The reviews are in and the motorcycle industry has spoken. The new Kawasaki Z900RS is the best handling, best looking, most incredible retro bike ever designed. According to the throngs of fawning middle-aged journalists it can do anything. Such is the power of the new Z900RS. But is it really all that?