Wooden Water Mains

[Lily left the valley]

I know this isn't as visually pleasing as many antiques that get shown here, but I thought this was pretty neat.

I stumbled across an article about 200 year old wooden water mains that were recently found during maintenance in Philly. They've since been removed from the scene to be used for educational demonstrations.



From the article:

The wooden pipes were apparently laid on "Back of Spruce, from Ninth to Tenth" between October 1811 and October 1812, according to a report from the department's archives. The department said Levine's research showed that the wooden pipe there was replaced in 1831 by a 12-inch cast-iron main.

Philadelphia began installing cast-iron pipes in 1819 and took its last wooden pipes out of service in 1858, though the pipes were not necessarily removed as they stopped being put to use.

Here's another article about them: http://www.phillywatersheds.org/resident-helps-spot%E2%80%94and-preserve%E2%80%94some-philly%E2%80%99s-oldest-water-infrastructure

[Gothichome]

Lilly, yes that is very interesting. Wood mains have actually been used for centuries in the many places with an urban infrastructure. The difference here, at least by my minimal reading on the subject is the use of a hollowed out log. Most of the articles I have read the mains were cooperd. The state of peservation is a good indicater of the quality of old growth wood and the anaerobic condition in the soil.

[Mick_VT]

They do a demo each year of making wooden water pipes from logs at my town's fair. Apparently they were used quite frequently in rural areas to pipe water to houses from springs. I was told that they did not really rot because the wood stayed waterlogged

[Al F. Furnituremaker]

There is a 3.5 mile above ground wooden pipe along Rt 9 in Vermont

http://thecarpentryway.blogspot.com/2012/06/wooden-serpent.html

[mjt]

Wow! You learn something new every day.

[phil]

a place I was working at used a lot of fir. I was asking where it came from and someone said it was harvested from under an area that was dammed. they flooded it without removing trees and they stood for a century or so. then they were pulling them out of the water and cutting them and the wood was just fine. That's the story I got anyway. I would have thought it would rot but I guess maybe not.

[Mick_VT]

a place I was working at used a lot of fir. I was asking where it came from and someone said it was harvested from under an area that was dammed. they flooded it without removing trees and they stood for a century or so. then they were pulling them out of the water and cutting them and the wood was just fine. That's the story I got anyway. I would have thought it would rot but I guess maybe not.

Wood doesn't rot when totally waterlogged and in a low oxygen environment. They have been pulling old growth lumber out of the great lakes for several years now, ones that sunk and got lost in the great log drives of old.

http://timelesstimber.com/

[Al F. Furnituremaker]

And in Australia they are getting it out of bogs.

[phil]

here lots of beach front homes get ocean logs rolling in. some look like they are pretty old and some are super nice wood. they get changed around when there are storms and high tides. some people go start cutting boards from them on the beach with chainsaws jigs and things but I think there is a certain amount of sand embedded at least in the outer layers. a lot of lumber is transported in barges and some of that must be in the water for some time.