Built by: Vince Lobosco in Middletown, New York

The Tijuana Taxi was one of my first models ever when I was a kid, I recently had the urge to start acquiring many of the Tom Daniels kits that I remembered, I bought whatever re-issues I could find but certain models, like the Taxi, are only out there on E bay or in someone's collection.

I found this Taxi as an old built up on Ebay, it was quite the glue bomb but had never been painted. After winning the bid and getting the box I went straight to work, I took the model apart and cleaned up what I could, some parts had so much glue, I had to cut pieces out of the model which ended up being a plus as it forced me into creating some scratchbuilt items such as a real wood floor for example. I decided to add some details--I found the Show rod Rally and ordered replacement decals from Decal Digs!

I painted the body with Tamiya bright orange, I built the floor from balsa wood and used scale rope on the chicken crate. I used "rub and buff" aluminum on the running boards and the drivers seat to make them appear worn. I replaced all the glass and added some items inside the back of the taxi such as the small pig, a reduced copy of Scale Auto and a photo etched fly swatter.

I added a new moon tank and aluminum injector stacks. I used scale chain to hold the license plate and weathered the pleated seats.

The final touch was to build the simple base with the little guy who is grinning from ear to ear after seeing the sign that says "USA - 12 miles".

This was a fun project and I have several others in the works, coming soon will be a restored Dragon Wagon and a Rommel's Rod.