that is one great kit!! almost all of Sal Taibi's designs were for free flight. Sal did die very recently, (October 2013 I THINK... ) he was a heck of a great guy!
I came across this advertisement... that kit went for almost FOUR DOLLARS!! (in 1941 )


BTW, the timer is for activating the dethermalizer... after a set period of time it would cause the entire horizontal stabilizer to go full trailing edge UP....
(in the event the airplane flew into a thermal that would be the last time you'd ever see it without a dethermalizer...)
all that on a 7 second engine run...