Surprisingly , on revspin.net it is still the 2nd most popular rubber , after tenergy 05. 

How does Mark V perform using water glue ?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5P0Ttc6vGdY&t=252" rel="nofollow - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5P0Ttc6vGdY&t=252

http://revspin.net/database/popular-rubber.html" rel="nofollow - https://revspin.net/database/popular-rubber.html is a database containing the current equipment used by people.   It's not an e-shop. 

Mark V was generally recommended as the "beginner rubber" ten years ago, and thus many people who have just started table tennis who look up "best beginner rubber" will find it and get it on their first blades. Revspin reviews are also more biased towards being written by "beginner EJs", as veteran EJs write reviews on mytt/ttd, not revspin.

Apart from that, it's a well-known rubber. Might not be the best for the price, but it's not as risky as purchasing a newer rubber with no review. 

it's all just marketing from companies saying there is a new incredible rubber every 6 months.

who would have thought!?!?!?!??!?!?!?

the same goes for blades.

a new blade comes out every other month.... and what are the top players using? viscaria, a blade created 20 years ago.

random dude: "hell no!!! mark v rubbers were made to speed glue!!! the NEW rubbers don't need this."

wrong.

in the past pros used speed glue.

now they use booster which is the same thing.

conclusion.

a tenergy 05 is not that different from a mark v.

a bluefire is not that different from a mark v.

Yes, I've never seen Mark V in tournaments either and I doubt I will. These aren't simply used for tournament level play.

Maybe they are popular at schools TT clubs and kids who are starting their training are using as coaches are recommending them en masse as an inexpensive but of good quality rubber to start?

P.S. A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away I used mark V and was pretty happy with it 

Interesting post..once upon a time I used Mark V MAX all the time and had great success with it, I think Stellan Bengsston also used it for professional matches, back in the 70's & 80's .

Recently I have been considering dumping my way overpriced T05 and going back to Mark V boosted

both feel very similar, but less impact on the bank account. 

That has not been my experience. The chap from the video at the top of this thread tends to change his rubbers once a year and his Mark V's always look in better shape than similarly used Tenergies of his teammates/opponents.

IMHO, it is 'virtually popular'. Number of people who heard of it and believe that it is a good 'safe' rubber to recommend to strangers  vastly exceeds the number of people who actually are using it (talk about brand recognition!). 

Tenergy probably belongs in that category as well (I've heard countless stories about how great and special it is well before I actually got a chance to try it), but it occupies 'professional' level, and no one is recommending it to beginners - because why would you, that's what Mark V is for :). 

The break happened in the 1993 to 1995 years. Until then speed glue was completely unregulated, you just used what was available from commercial Tyre garages, and bike shops. Speed glue is vulcanising glue, used in the industry to expand rubber and seal a patch on a tyre repair so that is does not leak air.

The first generation was more potent, more harmful and contained more VOC's ( volatile organic compounds) but more potent as a table tennis booster. 

 

The move from the ITTF, who had no control over the use was to ban it, led by the ETTA, who did actually ban the use for two years. No other national body followed  the ban, then in 1996 the ITTF sanctioned the second generation of Speed glues, with a lower content of VOC, deemed 'clean' and safer for general use. 

The ITTF now had more control, and of course, gave licence to TT manufacturers to produce and sell speed glue. 

With that licence came corporate responsibility, and the ITTF found itself in a place where they were actually sanctioning a product that could be detrimental the health.

that is why Speed glue was banned.

the speed glue offered by tt brands was waaaaaaaaay superior to any cheap vulcanising glue.

for example the butterfly fair chack would last for days and it was more potent than any non tt glue.

but it was not cheap.

that's why many coaches made their own home made glue and sold it to the players at cheaper prices.

they would use anything.

sometimes vulcanising, sometimes regular rubber cement with tons of thinner.

each one had their own formula.

but from my experience fair chack was unbeatable.

just a very thin layer and the rubber became a missile.

I remember pro players putting 3-4 layers of glue before playing a match.

in pro tournaments there was a room just for gluing where everybody would inhale all the toxics lol

That statement is so so wrong. Goodness knows where you got that information from.  The speed glue offered by TT brands was about 50% less effective than the the original 1st generation unregulated speed glues. I stake my life on that.  The unregulated glues had more VOC's, how could less be more superior? rubbish my friend, get your facts right lol, I lived and played through this period.

 

Tiptop, Pang, Veloflux, Brand names of first gen speed glues, the second generation were watered down versions offered by the TT companies, and most definitely less effective.

up to the ban of speed glue around 2008 nobody cared about voc's.

the aim was to make a better product, that's all.

why would butterfly decrease the quality of their "fair chack" with time?

this is starting to look like the myth that old viscaria plays many times better than a new viscaria...

 check you accuracy of history.

the effect is not very good.

I just used it to glue the rubbers, not for the effect.

it was cheap.

today you can still get the haifu speed glue.

you will see it doesn't smell too much, so it's not all about the voc's.

so all the companies who spent years developing speed glues know nothing.... but the "Pep Boys" from 30 years ago..... 

dont forget the 1st series viscaria with f l separated!!!

as for the smell, I always liked the smell of gasoline.

interesting subject.

I mean I can't just believe your word.

well in 2006 ittf ordered an analysis of speed glues..... probably until this point they didn't care much.

so the theory of tt speed glues being worse than random vulcanic glues is extremely hard to believe.

but we are all free to believe what we want.

have a good day buddy 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_glue

The first generation of speed glues were not marketed by TT manufacturers. The second generation were marketed by TT manufacturers. 

The first generation were superior in performance to the second generation by a considerable margin, certainly discernable by the noise made on contact with the ball which was a deeper 'tock' sound. 

You could tell if a player was using 1st generation because the sponge would be covered in a black layer of solids. In England there was a distinct period of banned speed glue of any sort between 1993 and 1995

until the second generation of 'clean' speed glues were marketed by manufacturers. Everyone who played at the time will tell you that they were not as potent in performance.

you are talking about 1993, I'm thinking about 2007....

 lots of different types of vulcanising glue, the brands we used were Tiptop, Pang, and in the early days Veloflux, they were all faster that any of the glues sold by TT manufacturers. 

Having speed glued every single time I played and sometimes twice a day and playing 4/5 times a week between 1980 and the final glue ban, and I used fair chack from its introduction until the ban I can freely offer you the advice that fair chack and any of the other ITTF stamped glues were slower.

 One answer could be that the unregulated stuff was more difficult to get right, too much would make the sponge so soft it was unplayable for quite a while and would feel really mushy. It peaks after about an hour and starts to feel crisp on contact with a much enlarged sweet spot. To me, nothing has come close to a well glued up set up.

 All very true, you could have a really bad loss or a really good win because someone had a bad glue day, mostly in my experience due to putting too much on which delayed the peak. I used two thin layers 15 mins apart to try to get some consistency. I'm also with you Baal, I didn't like doing it but had to in order to compete. Before sp glue, you had to trade spin for pace to an extent, but with sp glue you got pace and spin, altogether more energy and with a slower arm and bigger sweet spot so timing was easier.

People like to talk about gears in a rubber, well for me gen 1 speed glues gave the ultimate in that.

you will repeat the vulcanising is faster than fair chack.

I will repeat that fair chack is faster....

maybe we should just agree to disagree and that's it.

I mean sure you might find one glue that for some reason is better than tt glues.

but in a general and broader sense I would always pick the tt glue first.

they were made exactly for that purpose.

 

Actually before I switched to Bryce I used glued Mark V.  The top sheet is a bit like Tenergy actually.

People tired of paying for Tenergy and don't play a lot of tournaments?  Get some Mark V and glue it up with vulcanizing glue.  And enjoy.   

True. I have a solution that, IMHO, is far easier to implement / maintain: boost Baracuda with Falco Tempo Long. You'll be amazed by the results.

Old Haifu speed glue (before 2008) was really impressive on DHS and hard friendship sponges.

It was not nearly as impressive on German or Japanese sponges.

 No, you have things the wrong way round, Vulcanizing/tyre/bike glues came first, The TT manufacturers and ITTF were not getting any money out of speed glue so commissioned the glue factories to take a few of the worst additives out so they could mark the price up massively and sell to gullible TT consumers. It was essentially the same glue than was developed for expanding rubber generally, not for table tennis.