WHEN the announcement was made that inventor and horlogist Dr John C Taylor had been awarded an OBE in the New Year's Honours list he was 'uncontactable'.

But unlike most people at that time of year he was not sitting back enjoying the last few days of the festive season - he was thousands of miles away, in Antarctica, on a scientific expedition.

Dr Taylor, now in his 70s, is not a man who stays still for very long. He has hundreds of inventions to his name and when he is not working you may find him flying, ski-ing, mountaineering or out at sea.

Following his return to the Island we sat down for a chat for just an hour - but that simply wasn't enough time to hear all about a life well lived.

As an inventor he has an enviable record - he has filed almost 200 inventions leading to 396 patents listed in the European patent office.

Strix, the Manx electric kettle control company of which he is the former chairman, has sold more than one billion units of the kettle controls he invented.

And in the world of horology, a subject he is highly passionate and fascinated by, he invented, designed and built the Chronophage which sits outside Corpus Christi's Taylor Library in Cambridge.

The library is named after him and the Chronophage - which is a work of art -  was unveiled by Professor Stephen Hawking in 2008.

Dr Taylor is a quietly spoken man but when I asked him how he turns his ideas into a product his confidence shone through.

He said: "You can't make a product by the sum of bits, if you do that you get a dog's breakfast. You have got to think entirely holistically of what you are trying to achieve as the end product.

"If you don't believe that's going to take over the world then why are you bothering doing it?

"You have to start off with the belief this is going to be the best thing since sliced bread and you have got to make it the best thing since sliced bread and so every detail of it has to be done.

"You can't start off with detail and create a product, you have to start off with a product and refine the detail."

His ambition and self-belief when it comes to his work is evident.

"You can say by definition I am an unreasonable man because every reasonable man knows you can't change the world. I set off to change the world. Therefore by definition I am an unreasonable man," he said.

Dr Taylor has led a fascinating life and his connection with the Isle of Man goes back a long way.

His father and uncle were sent to school here to avoid the bombing in England during the First World War.

His father became an inventor - he started designing a new cotton fabric that was windproof and waterproof.

Later he went on to design electrically heated clothing for the Royal Air Force during the Second World War and it was also made for Australian, New Zealand and Canadian pilots.

In 1939 John Taylor was sent to Canada as an evacutee by his father and he returned to Britain in 1945.

His first involvement in the world of invention came when he was just nine years old.

Dr Taylor recalls there was a screw in one of the drawings for his father's inventions which was "my idea".

Like his father he was sent to King William's College in Castletown.

Dr Taylor recalled: "I am allergic to everything you can thing of, I am dyslexic and I was always ill. I sat the entrance exam to King William's and the headmaster reported I was practically illiterate and that I couldn't even spell the name of my school.

"He said I was reasonable in maths and science and on that basis alone he would take me into the college. I was in bottom in everything except maths and science."

After his time at King William's College he was physically unfit so didn't qualify for national service.

He took - and passed - the entrance exams for Cambridge University.

Dr Taylor had been flying and gliding since he was 16 and it was while he was at Cambridge he started rock climbing and mountaineering.

He went on the Cambridge Spitsbergen expedition of 1958 studying geology and helping research students map unexplored and uncharted areas.

He said: "I absolutely fell in love with the Arctic. Polar Regions are just amazing. We were the last of the heroic explorations, we had no radios, no helicopters, just manhauling sledges. It was just wonderful, you were on your own resources for three months with no contact with the outside world whatsoever."

Sadly, tragedy was to strike as one of his friends was killed in a mountaineering accident.

After a planned trip to Antarctica to study for a PhD fell through because of a lack of funding he 'drifted into' his father's thermostat company.

He eventually came back to the Isle of Man as he thought the Island would be a good place to bring up his children.

He was involved with Castletown Thermostats, which later became Strix, and concentrated on kettle controls.

Those products have now found their way into a billion homes and workplaces worldwide.

The hour I spent with Dr Taylor flew by - there was so much more to ask.

But it gave me a glimpse into someone who has lived his life to the full and there is no question that Dr Taylor is a man with a dogged determination who thoroughly enjoys continuing to be an "unreasonable man".

Also see: Dr Taylor "very proud" to receive OBE