In the late 1980s Mike Oldfield asked me to track down the original Manor Studios desk that he used to record Tubular Bells as he wanted to recreate the guitar sound that was used on the album.

When I found the desk it was in a very sorry state as part of the frame had been dismantled and what was left was very dirty and there was even some straw in the frame. I suspect it had been put in an outbuilding when removed from the studio when the Helios desk was installed in 1975.

I rack mounted two input channels and one of the stereo compressors.

The full guitar chain was a Fender Stratocaster fed into a passive DI which went to a channel input and the output of the channel fed the compressor.

The underlying support structure for the faders and routing switches was completely missing as were the side cheeks for the frame metalwork.

There had also been a problem with corrosion, mainly of the the nuts and bolts, but various small brackets as there had been a mixture of metals in the costruction.

The small brackets I have had replated and I have replaced every nut and bolt with stainless steel versions