September 15, 2026

Preview: Heller's Lancia Beta Monte Carlo Turbo short tail polished up ready to go again

Heller is making good the better of some of their older kits. Take this - the 24th scale Lancia Beta Montecarlo Turbo Short Tail brought back into life with refurbished moulds. See what's incuded in our preview...



Preview: Heller's Lancia Beta Monte Carlo Turbo short tail polished up ready to go again

Lancia Beta Montecarlo Turbo Short Tail
From Heller
1/24th scale
Kit no: 82741
Plastic injection moulded kit
121 parts
Width : 81.0 mm / Length : 183.0 mm
Available in October ’26.
Price on the Heller
Website: €29,99
The Subject: the Lancia Beta Montecarlo Turbo Short Tail
The Lancia Beta Montecarlo Turbo Short Tail stands out as one of the most fascinating engineering evolutions of the late 1970s and early 1980s racing scene. While built to conquer the highly competitive Group 5 silhouette class, this specific variation traded the elongated profiles typical of endurance racing for a compact, aggressive rear design. By truncating the bodywork, designers prioritized immediate throttle response and nimble handling over high-speed aerodynamics.
This deliberate design shift created a specialized sprint racer meant to thrive where longer, heavier cars struggled to find traction and agility.This nimble aerodynamic philosophy made the car a perfect match for demanding, technical circuits that punished high-speed setups. On tracks filled with sharp corners, rapid chicanes, and short straights, the vehicle could rotate quickly and accelerate out of bends with immense urgency. The shortened rear end maximized mechanical grip and allowed drivers to toss the machine into corners with absolute confidence, transforming it into a dominant weapon for shorter sprint events where victory depended on cornering efficiency rather than outright top speed.
The ultimate real-world test for this unique configuration came during the grueling 1979 Giro d'Italia Automobilistico. This legendary event was a brutal mixture of traditional racetrack battles and tight, unforgiving public road rally stages, demanding a car that could adapt instantly to vastly different driving surfaces. With its compact dimensions and specialized bodywork, the Short Tail excelled across this varied terrain, proving that Lancia's engineering gambit was not just an aerodynamic experiment, but a highly effective competitive masterstroke.

The kit:
Originally released in 1979, the tooling of this Monte carlo Lancia Beta Turbo short tail have undergone reconditioning, polishing, and repair to ensure today's production is as good or better than the first release.
This kit includes 121 pieces (width : 81mm / length : 183mm) and includes the iconic Alitalia decal scheme. the kit is already on sale on the Heller website, but the release is due for Octboer 2026.
A representation of the colour scheme below.
Check out more of Heller's releases on their website...