The Kirrule-type ferries (or Kubu-class) - Kiandra, Kirrule and Kubu - were three identical K-class ferries that operated on Sydney Harbour by Sydney Ferries Limited.
The three steam ferries were built in 1910, 1911 and 1912 at the height of the boom in ferry traffic across Sydney Harbour prior to the opening of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. They were the second largest type of inner harbour vessels and built for the rapidly increasing North Shore demand.
Sydney Ferries Limited generally choose Australian Aboriginal names for the early twentieth "K-class" steamers. "Kiandra" is a corruption of Aboriginal 'Gianderra' for 'sharp stones for knives' and a town in NSW. Kirrule is thought to mean 'aroused', and 'Kubu' "oak tree".
When built, they were the most refined of the K-class ferries, and among the largest of the type. As with all Sydney ferries at the time, they were steamers but were not among those ferries later converted to diesel power. Like all K-class ferries to date, the boats were all timber-hulled with timber superstructures. Later K-class ferries - sisters Kanangra and Kirawa (1912) and sisters Koompartoo and Kuttabul (1922) - were steel hulled with timber decks and superstructures.
The Kirrule-type continued the K-class double-deck, double-ended screw propulsion, rounded bows with two raised wheelhouses and a single tall funnel. They had enclosed upper and lower saloons with lower deck outdoor seating around the vessel, and the upper decks had smaller outdoor areas at either end around the wheelhouses.
Kirrule, Kiandra, and Kubu were built by Morrison & Sinclair Ltd, at Balmain and launched in 1910, 1911, and 1912 respectively. They cost £16,415, £17,087, and £17,138 respectively.[1] Their 68 hp triple expansion steam engines, built by Mort's Dock & Engineering Co Ltd, pushed them to 12 knots - considerably greater power than earlier vessels of the same size so that longer runs to Mosman Bay were quicker.
As built, the three ferries followed the standard Sydney Ferries Limited livery of the time; varnished timber superstructure, black hulls, and white bulwarks and trim and black funnels. In the 1930s, following the opening of the Sydney Harbour bridge, the white trim and varnished timber was painted over with a green and cream colour scheme.
In the early twentieth century and up to the opening of the Sydney Harbour Bridge in 1932, demand for Sydney Ferries Limited service across the harbour grew rapidly. Sydney Ferries Limited with a near monopoly on the inner-harbour (ie, non-Manly) services, had built up one of the largest ferry fleets in the world. Kirrule, Kiandra and Kubu were the second largest type of inner harbour vessels and were built to meet the increasing North Shore demand.
The three ferries, along with fellow K-class ferry, Kookooburra were used in the 1920s as weekend excursion vessels including carrying spectators to follow popular sailing races on Sydney Harbour.
All three ferries survived the opening of the Sydney Harbour Bridge when much of the fleet was quickly decommissioned as annual passenger numbers dropped from 40 million to 15 million. At midnight the day of the opening of the bridge on 19 March 1932, Kirrule was the last ferry to run the suddenly redundant Circular Quay to Milson's Point run.[2]
Passenger numbers continued to fall after World War 2 to around 9 million annually, and the privately operated Sydney Ferries Ltd fleet was taken over by the NSW State Government in 1951. Kirrule and Kiandra was laid up as part of a rationalisation of the now largely redundant larger ferries. Kubu was considered for conversion to diesel power, however, the conversion didn't happen and she and Kiandra were broken up in 1953.
Kubu survived the State Government's 1952/53 purge of the fleet. While Kanangra was being converted from steam to diesel power in the late 1950s, Kubu was the heavy lift ferry of the inner-harbour fleet. With Kanangra's 1959 return to service - now as a diesel vessel - Kubu was laid up. She was the last coal-fired steam ferry on Port Jackson (oil-fired steamer South Steyne was in service until 1974). Kubu was laid up in Blackwattle Bay where she settled into the mud. In the mid-1960s, she was towed to Kerosene Bay near Waverton and burnt in June 1965.[3]