Mike Melton
Thu, April 26, 2007 
From time to time, I get emails asking for information on framebuilder Mike Melton. I always respond that I have no idea where Mike is now. However, here is the little I do know.
I met Mike in 1980 a year after I came to the US and I was working for Paris Sport. I was building some aero-bikes for the US National Team. Time was running short and Mike Fraysee of Paris Sport brought Mike Melton in to assist me.
Mike was an established and well-respected American framebuilder from Columbia, South Carolina. We worked together for a week and obviously got to know each other pretty well during that time.
Afterwards we went our separate ways and usually met up at least once a year at the various bicycle trade shows. Mike continued his connection with the US team when he later went to work for Huffy and built frames for the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles.
In the years that followed he would design and build some carbon fiber frames for the US team and was somewhat of a pioneer, in building frames using that material.
Below is a picture of an earlier 1982 steel tube Aero frame that Mike Melton built for John Marino for his winning “Race Across America” ride. 
I have not heard anything of Mike since the late 1980s and I would love to renew our contact. I recently received a request for info from Matthew Marion who sent me the photos of his red Melton frame you see here.
I believe Mike is a few years younger than I am so he may or may not be retired now.
If he wishes his whereabouts to remain unknown, I will of course respect that. However, he may not even know that his past work still has a following and their owners treasure the fine crafted frames he built.
Update 1/29/11: Mike Melton died on January 26th, 2011, after a long illness resuling from a rare neurological disease believed to be spinal cerebella ataxia, similar to ALS or Lou Gehrig’s disease.
Reader Comments (22)
Good luck locating him.
Chris:
You know that Mike Melton and wife Debbie are in the horse business in Kentucky? I last saw him at the Interbike show maybe 4 - 5 years ago as he
was making his exit from Huffy and they had ended their Special Projects center.
Originally from Ohio, after the Navy Mike set up shop in South Carolina and established his original frame building reputation there. He later
moved to Ohio again and set up a tandem building workshop which got a lot of broader press because he employed immigrant Vietnamese workers (This was just post Vietnam war era.) He is a very nice guy and might be happy
to talk to you about that bike...Dale Brown
Eric
When you are at Cirque, you can bond with Dale and maybe track down Mike.
Eric
imapls, Smithfield, NC
My second frame was built by Mike and his team as a Huffy frame in 1989. I had done a few business favors for Huffy the same year I was going to Hawaii to compete in the Ironman. The frame is essentially identical to the one that Greg Lemond rode in the Tour de France in 1989. I was supposed to be the guinea pig for a new carbon fiber frame, somewhat monoque in design, known as Trident. Due to technical problems with the carbon fiber and the impending race in Hawaii, I received the "Lemond" frame instead of the Trident. Mike and his team worked out the problems a few months after my race.
Huffy's intended market for the Trident was competitive triathlete age groupers with some discretionary income. The price in the early '90's, when the frames became available, was about $3500, which was about twice what other high end bikes were going for at the time. Mark Allen rode a Trident in the Hawaiian Ironman in 1990 or 1991. My recollection is that Huffy wanted the Tech Center to become a bit more of a profit center, which Mike was not wild about. He was a frame artist, not necessarily a bike frame businessman.
I was fortunate to visit Mike in his tech shop in Dayton a few times. He had frames hanging from the ceiling, including some of the 1984 and 1988 Olympic bikes, both track and road. One of Lemond's frames was hanging from the ceiling. Mike told me about taking the funny bikes, the radical carbon fiber track bikes, to ride in the parking lot behind the shop. Each bike cost about $50,000 back then and he was taking them for joy rides across asphalt parking lots.
Everyone who knew Mike Melton back then always used the same description of him, "An extremely creative guy."
- Jeff Harris, Cincinnati, Ohio
Kevin Fitzsimons.
12-26-07
Mike's wife wife Debbie raced for Paris Sport Womens team during that time.
It was a very stiff and responsive bike. I raced on it for several years and did 3, 24 hour races on during the early 1980's.
Florence "Florrie" Graham Bradley
It's our family's first tandem, joining our fleet of eight single bikes and two unicycles. We've only logged maybe 15 miles on it (test ride with Dad+Mom and later with Dad+daughter) but we're enjoying it so far.
On the way home from the seller's house we stopped by the local tandem shop for fresh brake blocks and to plan some improvements, such as a new stoker handlebar and seat post to make more room in back.
I'd love to learn more about the history of the bike and its maker.
I knew Mike and Debbie quite well in the 80's. I ended up living one summer with them in Ohio and working with Mike building the Olympic bikes at Huffy (remember the bike the Steve Hegg set a world record on that was then promptly disqualified?). That was quite an experience that summer.
I got a custom track frame as a perk of the job with the condition that I not sell it to the Russians!! :>)
I lost track of Mike in the last few years. I would love to know where he is and what he is up to. No doubt he has something to do with race cars I'm betting.
Cheers, Lisa
I currently own an aluminum 7-11 time trial "funny" bike that was ridden by Alex Steida (his initials are on the chainstay). I ride it every summer in a weekly series and I rode it in the Fitchburg race back before this style of bike was disallowed. It's a very solid bike that I like to think saves me a few seconds here and there.
i have been riding a melton frame with a fixed gear setup for the last two years in chicago, but picked it up in dayton ohio. love the frame but just built up a new bike and need money so im selling my melton. its on the smaller side probably a 52 and the last two years have been rough on it but overall paint is still in good condition and frame still looks good. if anyone is interested in taking the frame off my hands let me know.
I am saddened to hear of Mike's passing. I met Mike and Debbie when I was a student at USC in late 70's. Along with Woody Grahm and Nicky DuPont, the Meltons were the heart of the Carolina Cylers bike club. He and Debbie were both strong riders-often taking off through the Carolina hills west of Columbia on one of their tandems with the rest of us in tow. These weekly rides through rural Carolina were a welcome alternative to class.
Mike was patient enough or foolish enough to tolerate me as a "shop rat" while I was at USC (77-79). He taught me a great deal about serious cycling and frame building, as well as sweeping and sand blasting. I had to smile when I read the post (above) speculating as to the source of the flattend bottom tubes which charactizered his tandem designs in 7]0's. Working in a fairly gritty basement shop (probably pre-civil war vintage), I can vividly remember (as the heavier one of us) standing on a metal jig which he created to consistently turn the standard round bottom tube into a flattened or oval tube. It was all about the milled cut, fit, jigs and set-up. Mike told me that he had learned his craft while stationed in Japan. He built his own jigs and tooling using a massively heavy lathe and he took great pride in getting his designs exactly right. As pricey as his frame sets seemed back then, the price charged did not begin to capture the amount of effort and care he put into each one. More than a craftsman, he was an artisan. You could see his skill in the clean welds and paint of the finished product, but what you could not appreciate unless you witnessed the process from start to finish was the precision with which he alinged, cut and millled the frame tubes so that they mated perfectly when pinned to the welding jigs. It was no surprise to me when I heard that he had been tapped to build very inovative bike sets for the Olympics.
My wife and I lost touch with Mike and Debbie when we moved to LA after graduation, but we always considered ourselves lucky to have been included in their circle of friends if only briefly. Our hope is that this post finds Debbie in fine health and good spirits.