I have miles of decking at two houses. All timber when put in the Australian sun will suffer. When building our beach house we decided to go for Spotted Gum and let it grey. Why fight it? We applied Cutek, and will on a regular basis. At our main house we have lots of Merabu or Quilla. Will not grey the same, and leaches lots of red stain. Cheap, but would not use again. What ever you use, use a good quality oil that seeps deep into the wood not a traditional stain/or top finishing product.

We used spotted gum for our decking and love it! We got it for $4.25 linear metre from Masters (any lengths that were inferior they were happy to replace). Our deck was built next to our near-white pavers so merbau was out of the question due to its leaching (plus we also were wanting an eco-friendly local hardwood if possible).

So we painted it black to match the other sides of the fence. It needs to be reinforced as its falling backwards but ok for now. I've bought some creeping Ivy to grown over it too and I'll get some boxwoods or similar to carve into spheres or balls.... Also founds some nice light teak / grey bench seats. If really like to do a few vertical gardens here but the fence won't hold it for now so this will have to do. Could be something we add to later. It'll take some time to even look remotely good but we're getting there. At least we have a plan! Thanks all for you suggestions!

We're doing the same, 2 sets. Want wood but have been told they "may" warp, even though under a covered alfresco. Don't have a firm cost yet but indication from builder is $10-15k more than powder coated aluminium. Total width of each set is 3250 divided into 3 doors, with stacking security screens. Don't have a price for the aluminium ones yet to compare but +$10-15k has probably helped with the decision. Have bifolds at current house but will be going for stackers at the reno house because they can have the stacking security screens, whereas bifolds are difficult to security screen, you can flyscreen but it's quite a flimsy arrangement.