Full Kustom Thunderjets: 2 Handmade Creations Redefine “Rare!”

At long last, I’m choosing this Saturday to profile 2 very special cars I purchased some time ago as additions to The Road Crew. You’ve already seen “teaser” images of these cars in a previous post, but now its time for a full up-close look at 2 magnificent custom-made creations I bought from the man who crafted them. Don’t go looking for these labors of love at your local hobby store or even online; these are hand-made cars fabricated by an old-skool slot racer right here in Colorado that you are unlikely to find anywhere, at any price, even though they were made in very limited numbers, so yeah, there are a few out there!

The saga of these cars here at Drag City begins with this post back in October of 2021 when I asked readers for any information anyone had on the origins of this amazing bright green Sunbeam Alpine S1 roadster I picked up at “Aladdin’s Cave.” Doug Jordan wasn’t sure where it came from, but he thought it might have been the work of an old Rocky Mtn “slottist” named Joe Furuli. No one really seemed to know, however; you can see a very in-depth profile of the car, with photos, in that post, but I was never able to verify its origins until the very early days of this year, when I had the pleasure of finally meeting Mr. Furuli in person, and having him verify that it is indeed his work. And he verified it in a big way: by offering to sell me another one! The top-up model I got from Doug thus got joined by a second iteration of the same car, the top-down version you see here! He had several he was willing to offer me in several different shades, and I opted for this “Jasmine yellow” model as having the most realistic countenance in comparison to the real car.

He made these without drivers, and I had a small pack of drivers I had bought from an online vendor a while ago since I depleted my stock of reproductions of the original Aurora “Vibrator-era” drivers some time ago. I found these 2 piece drivers that I thought I would try, and they’re OK, but their necks are awkwardly long, so I wound up having to snap the poor guy’s head off and shorten his neck and re-glue it after the fact, which was awkward, but he seems OK now!

This car does have a flaw, however, and that is heat-buildup from the motor gets pretty intense, considering it has no way to escape, and the body is small and tight. I can only run it for short times; there are some chassis mods I can do to the pan that will assist with cooling, but I haven’t taken those steps yet. Then again, all these Road Crew cars run around the track at low speeds, so it’s probably fine as long as I keep an eye on it. The original 4-cylinder Sunbeam Alpine-before it gained a small-block V8 and became the Tiger-was more a cruiser sports car than a serious performance car anyway, seeing as how the engine was low on power despite its durability, so it runs like the real thing! Looks like it, too!

Even more impressive, however, is one that Joe brought me on request because I told him I wanted it! Again, we go back to an earlier post and a car I bought from Doug @ PSH: the turquoise ‘56 Sedan Delivery.

I knew from what I had been told that Furuli had cast this car in 2 ways, both as the Sedan Delivery and also as a NOMAD! Well, how was a Tri-5 fanatic like yours truly supposed to pass that up? Thing was, Doug had had a couple at one time, but he’d sold them before I could get to them, so I asked the source if he had any to sell, and to my great disappointment, he told me he thought they were all gone!

Now, all Tri-5 fanatics know that the Nomad wagon is hardly just a “Sedan Delivery with windows.” To this day I remain amused when I hear certain guys at car shows trying to know like they sound what they’re talking about see a Tri-5 “Handyman” 2-door wagon and refer to it as a “Nomad.” Wrong! The Nomad is a completely unique car, with a glass area and roofline that do not match with any other body style, so Furuli’s Nomad had to reflect this if he’d done it right. And ladies and gentlemen, I think these photographs demonstrate quite amply that he did, indeed, do it right!

He came up with one for me from his personal collection, and though its a color combo that wasn’t available on the real car, do you think I’m complaining???

Now, even by his own admission, the front bumper on his ‘56 molding is little on the heavy side, and that’s why I elected to carefully pop the front bumper off the Nomad version and set it aside. It can be re-added at any time, but even though my own 1:1-scale ‘56 wears its stock front bumper, I’ve always thought the ‘56 looks particularly good with the bumper removed, and so for now I’m going with that tough “Street brawler” look.

These cars are 2 jewels of my collection, and we should all be thankful there are T-Jetters like Mr. Furuli in this world who are talented enough and patient enough to hand-craft their own Thunderjets in numbers just large enough to share with some of the rest of us! These babies stay in my collection as a testament to all our passion: Thunderjets FOREVER!