Taylormade Racing products are the result of a unique collaboration between engineering director Paul Taylor and designer John Keogh. They have worked together for many years on race and road bikes and Taylormade's stylish performance products draw on that vital experience.

On these pages you can find out more about how Paul and John work together to bring their creations from the drawing board to finished metal and carbon.

We are looking to up-date out design section with more regularity: if you have any requests or comments please do not hesitate to contact me: john.keogh@racetaylormade.com

John Keogh says: When I am producing a working sketch, I lay down the design in black ball-point pen, Magic Markers and coloured pencils on Letraset A3 marker paper (very flimsy), This is then scanned and re-touched in Adobe PhotoShop for the result you see here. Apart from my work with manufacturers, I supply 'what-if' drawings to magazines all around the world. Here are some examples of my work, real and imaginary...

The drawings shown here are termed in the design industry ‘renderings’: meaning full-colour final visualisations of designs. However these are usually the tip of the iceberg that is a design drawing programme with the majority of the drawings being pen/pencil sketches, Photoshop montages or 3D programme surfacing renderings (from programs such as Alias, Rhino, 3D Studio, etc.) Often such ‘presentation’ drawings are actually done after the first models have been built either as a marketing tool or as a confirmation of the link to some of the sketches (or more likely the designer just felt like doing the drawing he was supposed to have done right at the start!).

MotoGP aero

This was a fairly recent drawing; one of a number of studies into aerodynamic bodywork for motoGP. After working on the WCM Harris project I felt frustrated that there had been no time to refine the bodywork and particularly no wind-tunnel time: drawings like this one would be used in association with tunnel modelling to gain data on aerodynamic performance without going to extremes of fairing shape.

Husqvarna Tamburini

Another magazine illustration, based on the premise that Massimo Tamburini (designer of numerous Bimotas, the Ducati 916 and MV Agusta F4) was working on a SuperMotard. The truth was that I had the wrong designer and it was actually Miguel-Angel Galluzzi (designer of the Ducati Monster) who was working on the just released Husky SM610

Zongshen 1000

A speculative magazine illustration. Chinese giant Zongshen have always said they are building a superbike, and after a somewhat lacklustre V-twin two years ago, are re-grouping. My proposal is that it should be able to take on the top GSX-R and R1 and look something like this i.e. comparable but unique.

For the 2003 season WCM boss Peter Clifford needed a bike to compete at the highest level in order to retain his GP entry in what was to be a stop-gap year. Having previously run factory Yamahaís he turned to Harris (would had worked on the still-born Sauber GP bike) to build a bike in the quickest possible time.
In what proved to be an impossible schedule, work was started in January 2003 to build an all new race-bike. The bodywork patterns were built at Harris' Hertford workshops over a three week period and, while offering a distinct look, any refinements due to aerodynamic testing were precluded by time.
The political shockwaves that engulfed the bike after its arrival in the paddock are well known, but the fact is that it works well, and looks good!
As of November 2003 Peter is planning to build his own V6 to be slotted into a development of this bike.

Aprilia Concept

Paul and I were offered an Aprilia Mille chassis with a brief to come up with some concepts by Aprilia US. From a number of loose sketches this design was proposed and is currently half-way through modelling.

Benelli Tre all-road

This drawing is typical of my magazine work and is a forecast of how a big traily from Benelli might look. Designing for manufactueres rarely requires renderings to be taken to this level except for board presentations or for marketing.
But it is always useful to show a realistic representation of how the finished bike should look - this is the ideal, something to aim for.
When manufacturers consider the design of a bike, a number of this type of drawings will be produced along with numerous other detaqila dn conceptual sketches. The best or most practical details then go forward for conversion into a running prototype.