He first encountered pioneering early-instrument-maker Arnold Dolmetsch and his family in the autumn of 1917, when they took refuge from London air raids by renting a small house in Thursley before settling in nearby Jesses, Haslemere.
During the Second World War, he went to work in a Gosport boatyard, making motor torpedo boats, and then at the branch of the Admiralty that was based at Haslemere, where he made apparatus for radar research.
Further improvements were made and his harpsichords were played by noted musicians, such as Millicent Silver; they were exported to Australia, the Netherlands and the United States.
Authenticity of sound was demanded, and this meant abandoning the search for improvement of previous decades and returning to the baroque models.
The harpsichord played by American singer-songwriter Tori Amos on her 1996 album Boys For Pele and the subsequent Dew Drop Inn Tour was made by Robert Goble & Son.