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What is VELOX™? How Is It Different from Other Timber Post & Rail Fencing?

Velox-Hardwood-Timber-Post-and-Rail-Fence-Spotted-Gum

I have a small confession to make. 

For a company that talks about beautiful fencing all day, every day, we’ve had a slightly complicated relationship with timber fencing. 

Because some timber is beautiful. Really beautiful. 

There’s a warmth to it that steel, PVC or almost any other fencing material simply cannot match. Put a statement hardwood post and rail fence around the entrance to a beautiful Australian property, and it somehow belongs there. 

But then there’s the other side of timber. 

Rot. Termites. Posts moving. Rails twisting. Constant wetting and drying around ground level. And eventually, a fence that can look very different from the one you fell in love with when it was first installed. 

Over the years, we’ve spoken to countless property owners and fencing contractors across Australia about these problems. And what interested us was how often the answer was essentially: 

That’s timber. 

We kept wondering: Does it have to be done that way?  

Why should people who love timber accept that it’ll rot, warp and twist, will rob their weekends in maintenance, and compromise on the forever beauty of their property? 

That question eventually became VELOX™ – Premium Timber Post & Rail by Stock & Noble. 

VELOX™ is our patent-pending hardwood fencing system, created specifically for beautiful Australian lifestyle properties. It uses premium Spotted Gum, but many of the things that make VELOX interesting actually have very little to do with simply choosing an expensive species of timber. 

We’ve changed the way the post meets moisture and termites. We’ve removed traditional mortices. We’ve developed a system that connects the fence together for superior strength. And we treat, prepare, hand-finish and pre-oil every post and rail before it reaches the property.  

So, if you are considering a premium timber post and rail fence for a driveway, entrance, front boundary or lifestyle property, this blog will explain exactly what VELOX is, why we created it, how it differs from traditional timber post and rail fencing, what maintenance it requires, what it costs and, importantly, who we would tell not to buy it. 

What exactly is VELOX™ TIMBER POST & RAIL FENCING?  

VELOX™ is a premium, patent-pending Spotted Gum post and rail fencing system developed by Stock & Noble. 

And system is an important word here. 

If we simply wanted to sell beautiful hardwood posts and rails, there are already plenty of businesses in Australia doing that. 

We wanted to look at the whole fence. 

The timber. 

The treatment. 

The preparation. 

The connection between post and rail. 

What happens underground. 

What happens when natural timber wants to move. 

How it arrives on site. 

How it ages. 

How much flexibility an installer has. 

And, of course, how the finished fence looks as part of the property. 

That led us to four of VELOX’s most important differences: 

  1. No timber goes into the ground.
  2. We don’t mortice holes through the timber posts.
  3. The posts and rails work together as a connected, bolted fencing system.
  4. The Spotted gum is first fully H4-treated and then hand-crafted to enhance its natural grain. Finally, it’s coated with premium oil to preserve this beauty.

Those four decisions solve or at least significantly address the most pressing frustrations that made us question traditional timber fencing in the first place.

Why did we develop another post-and-rail timber fence? 

Australia certainly wasn’t suffering from a shortage of timber post and rail fencing. One of the biggest issues we saw was that some of the weaknesses of a traditional timber fence weren’t really being questioned anymore. They had simply become accepted as part of owning one. 

And to be fair, timber is a natural material. You will never completely engineer nature out of it, nor would we want to. But there are certain things we can control. 

One is putting a timber post into damp soil. 

Talk to enough people who have replaced old fences, and you’ll very quickly learn where deterioration commonly becomes obvious: around the section of post exposed to moisture and repeated wet-dry cycles. 

Then there are termites. We have clients in some parts of Australia who simply won’t entertain a timber fence because of their experience with termites and timber posts in the ground. 

That always felt like a shame. They might love the appearance of hardwood fencing. It might be absolutely perfect architecturally for the home they’re building. 

Yet they dismiss the entire category before the conversation even starts. 

So, we started there. 

VELOX™ hardwood timber posts don’t go into the ground. 

Instead, the timber post sits on a specially designed steel footing system, which is then concreted into the ground. 

It sounds like a relatively simple change. 

It isn’t. It fundamentally changes one of the most vulnerable relationships in a traditional timber fence: timber + soil + moisture. 

Spotted Gum itself has natural termite-resistant characteristics, and VELOX timber also goes through the treatment process specified for the system. But removing the timber from direct ground contact was, for us, an incredibly important part of addressing both moisture and subterranean termite risk. 

Notice we’re saying we’re addressing the risk, rather than telling you we’ve invented timber that can never rot or be attacked by termites. 

We haven’t. It’s still timber.  

VELOX™ doesn’t use traditional morticed timber posts.

This might be the biggest visual and engineering departure from traditional post and rail fencing. 

Typically, hardwood post and rail fencing uses morticed posts. Sections are cut through the posts and the rails slot into them. It’s a method people have used for a very long time. 

VELOX™ doesn’t use it. 

There are NO RAIL HOLES cut through a VELOX™ post. 

Instead, we’ve developed a bracket system that fixes the rails externally to the posts. 

At first, you might look at that and wonder why we didn’t try to hide the brackets. 

We actually went in the opposite direction. We made them a key feature in the Velox™ look. 

With chunky 200 x 200 mm timber posts and substantial 200 x 50 mm rails, a tiny hidden fixing would have looked apologetic. So the bracket belongs there. 

It’s boldly structural and, together with the steel detail around the top of the post, gives VELOX™ a true Stock & Noble character. 

But its job isn’t purely aesthetic. 

Why no mortices in hardwood post and rail fencing matter 

There was another reason we became uncomfortable with cutting large openings into beautiful pieces of hardwood. 

Every piece of timber is different. That’s its charm and its challenge. Cutting a mortice through a timber post introduces another opening through which water can enter, while also exposing internal sections of the timber. 

So, our thinking was surprisingly simple: If we’ve gone to the trouble of sourcing and treating a beautiful hardwood post, why cut a great big hole through it and destroy its natural strength? 

With VELOX™, the post stays intact. As nature made it, essentially. 

We machine it. We hand-finish it. We protect it. But we’re trying to preserve the integrity of the timber rather than unnecessarily cutting into it. 

There’s another advantage too. Because the rails are bolted to the bracket system, the fence operates more like one connected structure rather than a series of individual morticed posts, each largely doing its own job. 

That helps the whole fence support itself and assists in keeping those long, gun-barrel straight post-and-rail lines we all love. 

When natural timber inevitably decides it wants to move a little(because it will), the bracket system helps restrain that movement. 

Why did we choose Spotted Gum for VELOX™ Timber fencing? 

Engineering VELOX for longevity was important, but there was another side to the project that mattered just as much to us. 

It had to be beautiful. 

Once we had removed the need to select a timber primarily because of how well it performed buried in the ground, we had more freedom to ask a different question: which Australian hardwood is the most beautiful? 

For us, the answer was Spotted Gum. 

What we love about Spotted Gum is that it doesn’t all look the same. You can have rich browns and chocolate tones sitting beside lighter pieces, with pink, golden, yellow and even warm orange tones coming through. Then there’s the grain, which can change completely from one post or rail to the next. 

That wonderful variation was one of the reasons we chose it. Some hardwoods give you a more uniform, predictable look. Spotted Gum has more personality. And rather than machining all of that character away, we wanted to find a way to bring it out. 

So when the timber reaches our factory, each post and rail is individually worked on. It is machined where required and then hand-finished, with selected areas sanded to bring out the grain and natural character of the Spotted Gum while still retaining some of the substantial, slightly rustic feeling people love about Australian hardwood. 

There is a balance to it. Too rough and you lose some of that extraordinary grain. Too polished and it starts losing the rough sawn character that made you choose timber in the first place. 

So certain areas are highlighted. The grain starts coming through. Then the oil goes on. 

And that’s usually the moment the timber really starts showing off. 

For us, this handcrafted preparation is a big part of what makes VELOX™ feel different. It isn’t simply hardwood cut to size and sent out. We want the fence arriving at the property to already show you why our Premium Timber Post and Rail Fencing was worth choosing. 

Every VELOX™ Timber Post and Rail Fencing is supplied pre-oiled in OBSYDE. 

We made this standard rather than optional. 

VELOX™ arrives coated in OBSYDE, our premium penetrating clear timber oil. 

There are two reasons. The obvious one is appearance. Put oil onto Spotted Gum and the colours and grain become richer and more visible. 

The second is protection. From the moment timber leaves our factory, it starts experiencing the real world. 

Transport. Storage. Installation. Sun. Rain. 

Sometimes sitting on site while the rest of a project catches up. 

We didn’t want beautifully prepared hardwood heading out completely unprotected. 

OBSYDE is designed to penetrate into the timber and help protect against water and mould while preserving the natural VELOX™ appearance. 

There are additional details you won’t necessarily notice once the fence is standing either. 

Like, the steel footing connection is coated in bituminous tar before assembly, along with additional protection around the timber-and-steel connection points. 

It’s the sort of detail that probably won’t make somebody stop their car as they drive past your property. But it’s precisely the sort of detail we obsess over when we’re trying to make something last. 

What size is VELOX™ PREMIUM TIMBER FENCING? 

VELOX™ PREMIUM TIMBER POST AND RAIL FENCING has deliberately substantial proportions: 

  • Posts: 200 x 200 mm x 2500mm 
  • Rails: 200 x 50 mm 
  • Standard rail length: 2.7 metres 
  • Configurations: 1, 2, 3 or 4 rail 

Why those dimensions? 

This is a fence designed to have a presence within the landscape. The heavier proportions work particularly well alongside signature properties, long driveways, landscaped entrances and acreage. 

Also, since the bracket system isn’t dependent on pre-cut mortices; there is another useful advantage: your rail heights and spacing can be determined on site. 

Traditional pre-morticed posts arrive with those decisions quite literally cut into the timber. 

VELOX™ gives the installer and property owner considerably more flexibility to decide how the finished fence should sit within the landscape. 

What does VELOX™ TIMBER POST AND RAIL FENCING cost? 

VELOX™ is designed for high-end premium property owners who want to make a strong first impression. For the next 50 years. 

Current indicative material pricing for Velox post and rail fencing is approximately $245 per lineal metre, for a 3 Rail system. 

The property owner is paying for premium Spotted Gum, treatment, substantial timber dimensions, the steel footing system, purpose-designed brackets, individual machining and hand-finishing, pre-oiling, additional sealing and a fencing system designed around longevity and appearance rather than simply getting posts and rails into the ground as cheaply as possible. 

This price point is one reason we’re very clear about where we think VELOX™ belongs. 

It will work beautifully along a front boundary, through a driveway entrance, around the main house precinct or in those highly visible areas where the fence has a real influence on how the whole property feels. 

It could equally suit wineries, golf clubs, estates, parks and other properties where timber post and rail is already part of the landscape. 

But would we recommend spending VELOX™ money on kilometres of low-visibility paddock fencing if you simply need a functional boundary? 

Probably not. 

We think its sweet spot is what we often call the first-impression areas of a forever property: the places where material, proportion, detail and appearance genuinely matter. 

Is VELOX™ premium timber fencing suitable for horses? 

For primary horse fencing, our answer is no. 

That might sound surprising coming from Stock & Noble, because equine fencing is such a large part of what we do, but VELOX™ has been developed for lifestyle properties rather than as our dedicated horse-containment system. 

If you contacted us looking to fence horse paddocks, we would recommend Vanta™ – Premium Steel Post & Rail, which has been specifically engineered with horse safety and containment in mind. 

VELOX™ is better suited to lifestyle applications, front fencing and areas containing smaller animals such as sheep or dogs. If large animals are likely to charge, push heavily against or consistently pressure the fence, we would want to look at the application carefully before recommending it. 

Good fencing is about choosing the right system for the job. 

How much maintenance does VELOX Post and Rail fencing need? 

This is another area where we want to be very clear. 

VELOX requires maintenance. 

If you want a fence, you can install and then largely forget about from an appearance perspective, Premium Steel will almost certainly be the better choice. 

VELOX is natural hardwood, and keeping the rich, freshly oiled Spotted Gum appearance requires ongoing care. 

As a broad guide, we expect OBSYDE to need recoating around once a year. In harsher or particularly exposed parts of Australia, that interval may be closer to nine months, while in other environments it could be longer. Sun, rain, aspect and local conditions will all affect the timber differently. 

If you don’t maintain the oil, the timber will naturally weather and grey over time, just as other hardwood does. 

That might be a look some people actually like. 

But if you’re buying VELOX because you love the rich colour and grain you see when it arrives, then maintaining that appearance needs to become part of owning it. 

Bringing badly weathered timber back later is also more involved. You’re potentially looking at cleaning, sanding and then recoating, rather than simply maintaining it as you go. 

So yes, maintaining VELOX costs time, money and effort. 

But our view is that good maintenance is preferable to prematurely replacing beautiful hardwood fencing. 

How long should our Premium Timber Post and Rail Fencing last? 

The Spotted Gum we use has an expected above-ground service life in the region of 40 years, and we have designed the system around giving that timber the best opportunity to reach a long service life. 

By keeping the post above the ground, using H4-treated hardwood, avoiding mortices through the posts, sealing vulnerable connection areas and maintaining the timber with oil, we are deliberately addressing several of the common failure points of traditional timber fencing. 

Overall, we expect Velox to outperform an otherwise comparable traditional system where the timber posts are installed into the ground. 

That doesn’t mean we are going to promise that our every Premium Timber post and rail fence will look identical in 40 years. 

There are too many variables with a natural product and the Australian climate for anyone to make that statement responsibly. 

What we can say is that the entire system has been designed with aesthetics at its centre, in a way that it looks good for decades rather than the first few months.  

Premium Timber Post and Rail Fencing vs Traditional Morticed Hardwood Fencing 

If you have two quotes sitting in front of you and one is VELOX while the other is a traditional hardwood post and rail fence, don’t simply compare the species and price per metre. 

Ask what you’re actually buying. 

With VELOX, the additional investment is going into things including: 

  • Hand Selected Spotted Gum Hardwood from the best forest location in Australia 
  • H4 Treatment of all the timber used in the system to fight decay and extend life 
  • Handcrafted to enhance the natural beauty of each piece of wood.  
  • Pre-oiled with OBSYDE to reduce installation time and cost. And to increase the aesthetic appeal. 
  • No mortices cut into the posts, resulting in reduced cracking, reduced risk of rotting, termites and increased lifespan. 
  • Distinctive steelwork to enhance beauty  
  • Custom rails pacing – easily adjusted onsite for a tailored finish 
  • Substantial 200 x200mm posts and 200 x 50 mm rails for a strong, lasting and good-looking fence 
  • Patented Steel footing design makes sure no timber is below ground. 
  • A complete fencing system designed around long-term appearance rather than simply initial installation 

That’s a very different proposition from comparing: 

Hardwood post and rail fencing versus Treated Pine 

Or Spotted Gum vs Ironbark 

The species is only one part of the fence. 

Who is VELOX Timber post-and-rail fencing not right for? 

Here are some of the cases we wouldn’t recommend buying our Premium Timber post and rail fencing. If: 

  • Your biggest priority is achieving the lowest possible cost per metre. 
  • You have kilometres and kilometres of low-visibility boundary to fence and aesthetics aren’t particularly important. 
  • You’re developing a short-term, low-value property and don’t expect to benefit from investing in long-term details. 
  • You don’t want to maintain the appearance of natural hardwood. 
  • You’re primarily looking for a functional agricultural barrier. 
  • You need fencing specifically designed for horses or large animals such as vulls that are likely to run at the fence.  

 

VELOX is really designed for people creating higher-value lifestyle properties who care how the fence contributes to the whole property, especially in the areas everybody sees. 

What does “premium timber fencing” actually mean? 

This question sums up the whole project. 

Premium can’t simply mean choosing an expensive species of timber and putting a higher price beside it. For us, it is all the decisions surrounding that timber. 

Where it came from. How it was treated. Whether someone bothered to bring out its natural grain. How it was protected before it went to site. Whether a huge mortice needed to be cut through the post. What sits underground. How the rails work together. How the fence responds when a natural material inevitably starts moving. And what the whole thing looks like beside the home you’ve spent years creating. 

At Stock & Noble, we’ve always believed fencing deserves more thought than it often gets. 

On a lifestyle property it can run for hundreds of metres. It frames your driveway, entrance, gardens, home and paddocks. You see it every single time you arrive. 

That’s why VELOX exists. 

It’s our attempt to take the beauty people have always loved about Australian hardwood post and rail fencing, preserve as much of that natural character as possible, then rethink some of the traditional details that have frustrated timber fence owners for years. 

It’s still timber. It still needs care. 

And it’s certainly not going to be the right fence for every property. 

But for the right forever property, we think it’s something pretty special. 

In the end, we want to build a new generation of premium timber fencing worthy of the properties we know our clients are trying to create. 

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