3 minutes - magazine 02 | 2024
From carpenter to model maker
What began over ten years ago as a hobby involving a small wooden boat has now become Irishman John Murphyʼs main profession.
The trained carpenter has been working as a model maker since 2022, building a wide variety of construction machines to order and sending them all over the world. His latest creation is a Liebherr LTM 1650-8.1 mobile crane with Y-guying.
The small wooden boat that started it all today is still in John Murphyʼs workshop in the Southeast of Ireland – alongside various trucks and bulldozers as well as model Liebherr cranes. The latest project completed by the 61-year-old Irishman is an LTM 1650-8.1. “I first became interested in modelling in 2013. At first, I built models from specialised books. However, I soon realised that my real passion is detailed objects such as trucks and construction machinery. When I showed the models on Facebook, I immediately received enquiries asking whether I would also accept commissions,” Murphy explains.
Murphy takes some models to modelling competitions before they go to their new owners.
Pandemic as a turbo
He accepted the orders, initially alongside his main job as a carpenter. When work ran out during the pandemic, he finally turned his hobby into a full-time job. Depending on the crane model, Murphy spends between 150 and 400 hours completing each job. Piece by piece: first the wheels, then the chassis, then the boom and the cab. He rarely builds the same model twice. “A 100-tonne mobile crane is of course less work than the LTM 1650-8.1, which has been my biggest challenge so far. The Y-guying system is very complex and the variable ballast system is also a real challenge,” he says.
All of Murphyʼs models are made using traditional woodworking equipment: table saw, pillar drill, band saw, sanding machine, planer for levelling the wood – you wonʼt find any CNC or laser-controlled machines in his small workshop.
Besides cranes, Murphy also builds trucks such as the Scania 650 S in his small wood workshop.
Built to last
“At a scale of 1:20, many details can be recreated. There is no engine and only the slewing bearings are made of metal, but otherwise my models have the same functions as the originals,” he explains. So itʼs all made of wood – maple for the lighter-coloured components, walnut for the darker ones, sapele for the interior and wawa wood for the lights and mirrors.
Before Murphy sends the not-so-small replicas to their new owners all over the world, some of them are taken to the British Motor Museum for an exhibition or for a technical demonstration in front of a crafts class. When everything is ready, each component is wrapped in protective bubble wrap and packed in a plywood box. “A little prayer before handing it over to the courier never hurts and then the model is on its way!”
This article was published in the UpLoad magazine 02 | 2024.
