Tijuana Taxi

Built by: Don Culley 

This Tijuana taxi was purchased in a box lot on Ebay.

 

What looked to be a decent build up turned out to be a major glue bomb.  Most of the pieces were either missing or damaged , but I figured that this would be my only chance at building one of these kits. I was able to trade for some parts I needed and other were donated by the show rods guys . After many hours and  cut fingers, I was able to start rebuilding. 

 

The roof and body had indents from glue, which were filled in.  The back seat roof seat and divider all had glue damage, so I sanded the damaged parts ,built them up with squadron putty and formed new pleats in the "upholstery" . 

 

The front and rear end , rear shocks, both fenders and the running boards were all broken and were repaired using parts from my junk box . 

 

The windshield was cut down from a  "Bad Actor" rear window, and the side glass was made by cutting the "Bad Actors" sunroof  in half. The opera windows  were caked in glue, so I tried wet sanding them ,then  polishing them with McGuire's plastic polish. They came out  better than I figured . 

 

The body is painted with plasti kote orange, which was the closest to the box art, and then polished. the seats and fenders were painted with Tamiya violet ,and the engine block was sprayed gold. the floors and the roof crate were painted different hues of browns and then dry brushed to give the effect of age on the wood .The decals are from Dkal Dan. This was the most time I have ever spent on a model, but I'm happy with the results. From start to finish, this kit took nearly a year to complete ; I received two roof ropes just last month to complete it. 




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