A father and son from Hobart are using timber that has been salvaged from a leaky wooden pipeline to build boats. The wood is King Billy Pine, a timber considered even more rare than Huon Pine. Source: ABC News
The King Billy Pine was used in a heritage-listed pipeline used to carry water at the Lake Margaret Hydro Electric scheme on Tasmania’s west coast.
The wood is 80 years and it is a beautiful Tasmanian boat building timber but very difficult to get.
Cutting off the grey and weathered areas of the old wooden pipeline revealed a pink-coloured timber with the timber itself having both strength and light weight.
The wood is being used to handcraft a small lake boat that looks like a canoe as well as a 7-metre sailing boat.
The King Billy pipeline was sold off for a dollar a metre and the wood has ended up in some interesting places.
In Queenstown there’s a van driving around with pipeline boards on it and there’s a house in Kingston Beach that’s been re-clad with the pipe boards.
