[3] The title of his master's thesis was The reconnaissance geology of the Eglinton and East branch valleys, Western Southland.
[4] In 1973, he was awarded a DSc by the University of Otago, on the basis of published and unpublished papers submitted as a thesis.
He spent time on the West Coast, where he assisted Harold Wellman, and also worked on the displacement of the Alpine Fault.
He was the senior geologist of the northern party of the New Zealand Geological Survey Antarctic Expedition in 1961–62, which named the Grindley Plateau in the Queen Alexandra Range in his honour.
[7] Grindley died at his home in Lower Hutt on 12 February 2019, aged 93 years.