Bought my first new board there after learning on a used OA. A rocketfish, two tone white twin fin. I was 15 or 16 years old and my mom drove me. I remember the showroom with big glass windows but cant remember where it was for the life of me. For some reason, I think it may have been on US 1 in Melbourne? But I honestly dont have a clue. Ah, the 80's. Can anyone clear up my foggy memory? TIA...

MTB Surfboards factory showroom: 2418 Harbor City Blvd Melbourne, FL 32901. Pretty sure that address is Island Tile now.

Around the same time, my first "kevlar" board from MTB. Un-dingable it was supposed to be. My friends wanted to throw rocks at it, in order for me to prove it.

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Worst thing I ever read - "No tropical cyclones at this time"

Edited: 04/15/2019 at 04:26 AM by wehorde

That's unreal cool(the kevlar part, not the throwing rocks part, although funny). I've seen Catri boards from that era with kevlar, but never a MTB.

Kevlar repairs were the worst, the stuff never got fully dry and would fray like a mofo. Not to mention it sanded like... hell, I can't even think of a comparison? All I can say is I hated it.

To the topic, that place was like magic land, sooo many beautiful surfboards!

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I was right.

Edited: 04/15/2019 at 06:04 PM by Cole

My MTB twin fin channel hull was the board of the 80's. Pink. It was a 5'9" thick floaty speed demon. I loved that board. The glass job seemed like it was 2 oz cloth, not really but that board was not meant to last. I had it til it died. Juno Surf SHop was their distributor in Palm Beach County. I would love to see that board in perfect condition again.

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"One of the reasons why propaganda tries to get you to hate government is because it's the one existing institution in which people can participate to some extent and constrain tyrannical unaccountable power." Noam Chomsky.

Edited: 04/17/2019 at 08:53 AM by SurferMic

file:///C:/Users/Brian/Desktop/mtb.htm I tried

Edited: 04/16/2019 at 01:05 PM by tingo

I worked for Donnie Mulhern at that factory for 4 or 5 years starting around 1981 if I remember right. Sadly, a lot of the old crew are gone now. Bobby Strickland, RS, drowned years ago. Joe Shriver, a very underrated shaper also shaped MTBs. Joe died suddenly while shaping for WRV in Hatteras. Shriver was the last guy anybody would predict to die suddenly; he was in such good shape. Our airbrusher was the incredibly talented artist Gary Philhower. Gary's gone now too. Freddy Grosskreutz was our laminator, and I don't think the east coast ever saw a more talented glasser. Sadly, I attended Fred's memorial last April, with my good friend Bud Gardner ... and now I'll be attending Buddy's memorial the 27th of this month. I am pretty sure Larry Pope, our sander, is still alive and kicking. Don't know about Ted Gardner, who did our fins. Sure hope he's still alive. At Fred's memorial, his wife Sue told me she'd come across a photo of "the crew" at one of our frequent BBQ's ... kind of hit me hard when Sue said "you know, JR, I think you might be the only one left alive." I sure hope not. One last thing: there were a lot of really good board builders around in Brevard in the 70s and 80s. And I believe our little crew at MTB built the best damn boards of everybody at the time. Despite ourselves. It amazed people, to see the beautiful boards our crew of misfits created. - Joe Roberts, aka JR, who tried his best, as the polisher, to add my little bit of perfection to the mix. No doubt, Donnie Mulhern had a heck of a crew back then. I sure miss those who we've lost.

Very sobering JR. Thanks.

I eyed many of those beautiful boards and don't recall a single wheel mark.

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I was right.

I owned three of them. Back then, in palm beach county, it was MTB, Natural Art and Fox. In that order.

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"One of the reasons why propaganda tries to get you to hate government is because it's the one existing institution in which people can participate to some extent and constrain tyrannical unaccountable power." Noam Chomsky.