Designer
of revolutionary valve system helped to establish Ducati as the
world's
greatest manufacturer of performance motorcycles.Ducati renown in the
world
of premier race bikes has won more World Superbike races than all other
motorcycle
manufacturers combined, despite sales that account for only 1% of
the
market.
Taglioni
adapted the desmodromic valve to motorcycles, which eliminated
conventional
valve springs and allowed engines to rev higher and produce
greater
power. Taglioni also designed a 90-degree L-twin engine that
contributed
to two legendary racing victories.
=====================================================
FABIO TAGLIONI: MOTORCYCLE
ENGINE DESIGNER
By Susan Carpenter
Los Angeles Times Staff
Writer
July 28 2001
Fabio Taglioni, the Italian
designer whose revolutionary valve system helped
to establish Ducati as the
world's greatest manufacturer of performance
motorcycles, has died. He
was 80.
Known as "Dr. T," Taglioni
died of a heart attack July 18 at his home in
Bologna, Italy.
Taglioni was Ducati's design
soul. His innovative engine is, in large part,
the reason for the company's
renown in the world of premier race bikes.
Ducati has won more World
Superbike races than all other motorcycle
manufacturers combined,
despite sales that account for only 1% of the market.
The roots of Taglioni's
legacy were planted in 1957, when he created the
system that would come to
define both Ducati and his career: the desmodromic
valve, which eliminated
conventional valve springs and allowed engines to rev
higher and produce greater
power.
Taglioni did not invent desmodromics;
the concept had been around since the
earliest days of the internal
combustion engine. But he was the first to
successfully apply it to
motorcycles.
The 1957 debut of his 125
Desmo single revolutionized the industry. The desmo
drive was initially used
in Ducati's race models only, but it was
incorporated into the company's
street bikes in 1968 and has been used in
every model built since
1980.
Taglioni made other advances
in motorcycle mechanics in his Mach 250, which
in the 1960s broke distance
and speed records. In the early 1970s, he
designed a 90-degree L-twin
engine that contributed to two legendary racing
victories: Paul Smart's
win at the 1972 Imola race and Mike Hailwood's
comeback victory in 1978
on the Isle of Man in Britain.
In 1989, Taglioni resigned
from Ducati for health reasons, capping a
35-year-run of engineering
and design innovation.
"His name was synonymous
with Ducati," said motorcycle analyst Don Brown. "He
came out of an era when
there were only a handful of really talented
designers in the motorcycle
world--an era when individuals tended to make a
bigger mark than in today's
environment, where they get lost in the corporate
staff and huge R&D budgets
and you don't tend to know who designed the
machine."
Taglioni was born Sept. 20,
1920, in Lugo, Italy. His father was an engineer
who ran an agricultural
machine repair business.
At 21, during World War II,
Taglioni was drafted into the military and worked
as an airplane and motorcycle
mechanic. He received his industrial
engineering degree from
Bologna University in 1948 and began his career two
years later as a design
consultant with Ceccato, a motorcycle manufacturer
that specialized in 75 cubic
centimeter and 100cc sport bikes.
Two years later, he left
to join the design team at the larger and
better-known FB Mondial.
Taglioni worked alongside the company's esteemed
design chief, Alfonso Drusiani,
developing plans for a twin-cylinder engine,
but he left before it went
into production. Believing that he would have more
independence and also be
able to design complete machines, not just
individual components, he
joined then-unknown Ducati to head its technical,
planning and experimental
departments in 1954.
In less than a year, Taglioni
had his first success with his design for a
single-cylinder 100cc engine.
Known as the Marianna, the motorcycle won three
successive titles, from
1955 to 1957, at the Motogiro road race and two
others in the Milan-Taranto
race.
Taglioni was not a racer
himself. In his spare time he liked to relax by
tending to his garden. He
was especially fond of orchids. He was also a
painter, whose favorite
subject was ancient Middle Eastern architecture.
Taglioni is survived by his
wife, Norina, and daughter, Piera.
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