Words: Tommy Parry
Kurt’s been circle track racing for 15 years. After a while, it got to be a little tedious, so he set his sights on a new challenge. At the time, he had an ‘85 Monte Carlo SS which was mildly set up for autocrossing. It didn’t quite cut the mustard for him, so he bought a ‘75 Monte Carlo from a friend he met at his local autocross. With this new platform, he started a project with the aim of defying physics, running at the front and beating Mustangs.
Immediately, he began stripping it down to box and brace the frame. After looking for a kit and finding them all too pricey, he fabricated one of his own by drawing on his experience in Sportsman-type racing cars. This background would suit him well throughout the rest of this budget build.
This project, dubbed “Project Land Yacht,” desperately needed to diet. To try and trim weight wherever sensible, Kurt deleted the front core support, inner fender wells, most of the trunk and the entire floor. The regimen made a ton of difference, dropping the weight from around 5,400 pounds to 3,300 pounds with Kurt in the seat!
Soon after, he demonstrated his metalworking mastery with plenty of tin in the place of the car’s recently excised skin. It was his familiarity and ease with metalworking which propelled this ambitious build, as Kurt only had so much to work with; he has two girls.
The motor is another item grabbed from the circle track parts pile. A sealed “602” crate motor from a Sportsman car, this punchy motor provides more than enough to put around. It features 180-degree headers from a limited late model and a few other goodies. For ease of use, it sends its power back to a TH350 automatic transmission, then back to a full floater 9″ Ford rear end with the stock locker.
Next came the exhaust, which Kurt had laying around in his garage; it would fit the new platform with a bit of tweaking. This required that he cut out the floor completely and use the aluminum interior from a limited late model to seal off the bottom of the car.
The footwork is composed of leftovers from a former project, too. Kurt installed his Carrera coilovers, but had to get creative. They aren’t in the stock mounting position, so he had to build bay bars to attach the coilovers up front and weld new mounts for the rears. No worries – this was child’s play for Kurt.
Though he sourced the steering from ‘71-‘81 Camaro components, he went back to the parts pile for the braking system. With dual Wilwood manual master cylinders, stock rotors in the front with Howe single piston calipers and the .810 discs with metric calipers in the rear, the big behemoth stops surprisingly well.
The package has been enough for Kurt to make a name for himself at local autocrosses and inspire a few dumbfounded reactions from the opposition. “I’ve been able to put my car in the top-ten several times, which is a huge accomplishment in my eyes. It’s fun to see the look on people’s faces when I put up a time faster than a Miata or anything AWD,” he says.
Once he finds the right gearing and sorts out a few mechanical gremlins, he plans to improve the brakes and drivetrain. With those items in place, he’ll set his sights on the Optima Street Car Challenge. Though it won’t be the lightest or shortest machine on the grid there, Project Land Yacht will certainly turn some heads – and turn a few faces red.
To keep tabs on Kurt’s build, you can visit his build thread here.
