Ormston Pedal Steel on Ebay

[joehw]

Just seen this on eBay.

Anyone know the history of these London made Ormston steels?

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Vintage-Peda ... ba99ad47d5

[JohnDavisStringsHere]

A Rose by any other name is still a Denley produced by Gordon Huntley and Nigel Dennis and you would have to be Richard Burton AKA "the spring man" to get it playing and staying in tune, It should really be in the Horniman museum alongside Gordon's ZB for a real piece of steel guitar history.

[Tony Russell Davis]

A "Denley" (by Nigel Dennis and Gordon Huntley) re-badged and marketed by James "Ormston" Burns around 1966. Single neck, 4 pedal and twin neck 6 pedal versions. There was a very telling publicity shot of the twin with a girl in floral trouser suit behind it holding a lit and half smoked cigarette
Jimmy Burns was originally a lap steel player although much more famous as a standard (if any of his guitars can be called standard) guitar designer/maker.
One of the more frightening sights was to see him in Bob Hall's back shop (a music shop owner in my home town of Gateshead) dressing the frets of a new Guild acoustic with a big file and NO tape, masks or other protection!

[Mcneilwaeasteel]

A picture's worth a thousand words but perhaps not in this case, hope this helps along with the information, weight was not a consideration when this guitar was made!
Robert

[Tony Russell Davis]

Yeah Robert, dat's it!

[simon_f3]

Beautiful! If I still had my Denley I would be tempted to try to replicate that photo - although good taste and forum rules may prohibit such behaviour

Interesting that the Ormston looks a lot like the Denley I bought as my first PSG, but seems to have been a bit better 'value engineered'. My Denley had 2 pickups per neck, and separate volume and tone controls for each neck, plus there were coil taps in the pickups (controlled via push/pull switches in the potentiometers), though I don't know if this was a modification done by a previous owner. All the castings and hardware look to be identical to the Denley.

Part of me wishes I had kept it and persevered with tinkering, but it did the job as a learner instrument to get me hooked, and so I sold it on and bought a much more expensive guitar! Seemingly a common phenomenon amongst steel players!

[joehw]

Thanks for the wealth of information!

You’re right JD it should be in a museum. Is there a steel in the Horniman?

[JohnDavisStringsHere]

Yes Joe, Gordon's old ZB now resides there and the miserable "Jobsworth" I spoke to would not let me put a set of strings on it! to keep it in playable condition preferring to keep it "as was" but they would not mind if I could provide them with some music that was played on it! NOTHING about the man that played it! .... It is not there as a tribute to Gordon as I understand it but as an example of the evolution of the steel guitar, to which that Denley/whatever would be much better suited! IMHO.