Revell Monogram

1/24 Tijuana Taxi

Kit Number: 85-4261

Reviewed by  Chuck Hermann, IPMS# 33111

MSRP: $22.95 Website: www.revell.com The Tijuana Taxi from Revell-Monogram is a reissue of a kit that had not been seen in 34 years. But instead of cleaning up the old tooling, which apparently has been lost, Revell-Monogram has made brand new tooling for this kit as well as several other old 1960's iconic custom kits. This wild custom was designed by Tom Daniel, who did many original custom designs in the 60's and 70's that were very popular kit subjects. The inspiration for the design was an antique Spanish taxi Daniel saw in Mexico. He added lots of hot rod parts to come up with this wild custom version. Daniel is still an active artist and designer, besides his many collaborations with Revell Monogram his work includes designing several Hot Wheels cars. To see his designs and artwork you can go to his website at www.tomdaniel.com. Artwork and T-shirts for this kit and others, like the Rommel's Rod, are also available. The Kit The kit comes in a sturdy box, with the classic original Monogram logo box art. The sprues are bagged by color, with 3 sprues molded in orange, one in chrome and one in clear. The orange body and frame are molded together, an unusual design. The instructions appear to be duplicates of the original with a vintage feel. In fact the whole kit is a trip through time, since the new tool appears to be a copy of the original in design and feel of assembly. Since it is new tooling, there is no flash on the sprues but like older kits the attachment point of parts to the sprues, especially the chrome pieces, make removing pieces tricky. Many chrome pieces are damaged by either the attachment point or by mold lines in very visible spots on the finished model, which was common back when this came out originally. Body The body is one main piece, with a separate cowl that needs to be glued to the front to hold the chromed firewall. The fit on this is poor, there are no well defined points to glue it together so be careful here. I glued it together prior to painting so I could reshape it where the glue ran a bit then sanded it for painting. Obviously this was not an actual car, so in trying to figure out the "correct" paint scheme I looked at the box art and also at pictures on the web site www.tomdaniel.com. These appear somewhat contradictory, one shows a black or gray frame, the other shows the frame finished in the orange body color. There are some basic painting instructions on the instruction sheet. In the end I went with Tamiya TS-12 Orange Lacquer for the body and frame, sprayed from the rattle can. This matched the box art fairly well and covered the bright orange plastic without primer. There was a slight mold line on the rear of the body which sanded off easily enough. The separate roof was painted in basic flat black. There are clear plastic pieces for the windshield, the divider for the passenger compartment, rear windows and the oval opera windows. I used a combination of silver paint and Sharpie to accent the trim, perhaps some Bare Metal foil would have been better but mine must be dried out as it would not stick. Engine The engine is a 12 piece assembly. It is a V-8, possibly a Pontiac (Poncho) with dual quad Weber carbs. The valve covers and carbs are chrome, but curiously the exhausts are not, so I painted them white. The tops of the carbs were drilled out to simulate the tubing style Weber air stacks, as molded it was just a blob on top of the carb. The plastic parts were painted flat red with a touch of weathering, and I picked out some details like the molded on starter with black and silver. I know many of these classic show cars were built for display and did not really operate, this may explain the lack of any radiator. There is one issue with the engine. Assembled straight from the box it does not mount into the chassis, as the generator attached to the fan belt assembly is in the way of the mounting spot on the frame. I wound up shortening the generator until it fit in place.

Suspension The suspension is pretty basic, a chrome front axle that attaches to the frame via chrome springs. The springs are molded in two pieces, so gluing them together leaves significant mold lines. I did a wash of flat back to highlight the springs, but it you intend this build to be contest quality you would need to find a substitute piece or make your own springs. The chrome rear end also attached to pegs on the frame, like the front, and the shocks and arms glue onto it. The tires are vinyl rubber, with chromed mag wheels. I painted the inside of the wheel backs black to accentuate the spokes. They push onto pegs on the frame. This is simplistic but it is a sturdy attachment and my example sat flat on all four wheels when assembled. Make sure you attach all the suspension at the same time; I had to redo mine to get the suspension arms to mate up with the front axle. Interior The floor of the interior is wood grain, I painted it flat black then did a wash of flat black and darker brown to highlight the molded in graining. The dash also has wood grain, for the three gauges there are decals to provide the details. There is a slight problem with the instructions related to the interior. They show incorrect locations for gearshift and accelerator pedals, so switch mounting location of parts #14 and 13. Otherwise the tall shifter rubs up against the seat. Most of the seats feature a molded in tufted finish. While the instructions indicate that the seats should be purple, I did not have any in my stash so instead I airbrushed all the seats with Testors Model Master flat British Crimson. This goes well with the orange body. I then did a wash of all the seats.

Decals and Custom parts Since this a wild show rod there are some extreme custom items on this car. The front grill features a molded in round keg shaped gas tank, but the chrome grill has a severe mold line around the edges that is very visible. A set of bull horns serves as a hood ornament. The headlights are attached to the grill shell by a very thin rod, as I tried to scrap off the chrome on the headlights (due to the mounting points to the sprue causing a very visible blemish in the chrome) one broke off. Since it is so thin it was difficult to get it reattached. Once the chrome was off I painted the headlights gold and popped in the clear lenses. The roof is a busy place, as a chicken coop is chained to the top. I did the wood grain treatment to the coop, and put the chicken inside - the kit contains three scale chickens, two for inside the coop and one with a separate base, depicting it flying away as the taxi motors down the road. There are chromed side rails on either side, and a taxi sign facing the front. The instructions show a decal for the TAXI lettering, but the only one on the sheet is way too small. So I printed up some labels with a fancy font until I got one that looked right, then trimmed it to fit into the sign. There are running boards that look like ornate Spanish style railing. These should be chrome but they are not, so I painted them silver. There is a third row seat on the back of the roof, also some seats on top of the rear fender. The only taillights are molded into the fenders and I painted them clear red over silver. The trunk here is indeed a wooden trunk, I applied a wood finish over the molded in grain. There is a small decal sheet, with the Tijuana Taxi logos which I put on the side along with some other optional markings which I left off my model.

Summary I had fun building this kit. It is not something I would usually do, but it brought back memories from the past, especially the nostalgic design, box art and instructions. Except for the few problems noted, it went together well. It is rather simplistic, and would need a lot of modifications if you wanted to do a true contest quality build. But as a straight from the box build it was enjoyable. Thanks to Revell Monogram and IPMS/USA for supplying the review sample.