Monogram 1/24 Tijuana Taxi

Without a doubt, one of the most prolific custom car builders of the 1960s and 1970s was Tom Daniel. He built  full size cars to be sure, but he is best remembered by all the various plastic car kits he developed. Most of them were for Monogram and he did nearly 200 of them over the years.

According to the instructions, the molding for the Tijuana Taxi disappeared over the years (similar to what happened to Rommel's Rod) and so this is, in effect, a brand new tooling. A check of the underside of the body shows a 2009 marking. It seems that R-M thinks there is a market sufficient to take the time and trouble to re-mold kits like this and I'm sure there are many who are pleased that they have done so.

The kit itself is molded in orange plastic, undoubtedly to facilitate painting. The instructions hawk a 'New and Improved' chicken for the roof cage and that really adds to the value....... The parts, are, as you might expect, very nicely molded and flash free. The chrome sprue is particularly well done and those building this kit will need to be careful about removing parts to minimize damage to the chrome. It will be inevitable that some parts will need touch-up and for that, the easiest fix would be chrome foil of some sort.

For sturdiness, much of the frame is molded integrally with the body. One then pretty much starts attaching bits and pieces until the car is complete. The engine, while not highly detailed, is nicely done. I found it interesting that the exhaust are not chromed as you might think on a show car. Four very well done vinyl/rubber tires are included. Clear bits are also well molded and quite clear.

Instructions are retro and probably from the original boxing as all colors are generic. Each construction step has a small circle where you can check off what you have already done. I sort of like this approach to things. The small decal sheet is well printed and provides some options.

I know that car fans appreciate seeing these reissues as it means they don't have to pay collector's prices for hard to find kits. It must be doing fairly well as the LHS seems to have sold quite a few of them.

December 2009

You can find this and many other neat kits and accessories at GreatModels