Can't we put this one to bed gentlemen?

The Senior Telemaster (STM) is available as an ARF, (ARTF in England,) or as a builder's kit.

The ARTF is available in two colour schemes and comes supplied with a large fuel tank and hardwood engine mounts for a glow engine. If you want to fit an electric motor you may have to trim away the inside of the engine bearers to accomodate the motor. I've done this on mine and fitted a 1400 watt electric motor mounted on stand-offs made up from threaded rod. However, as the STM only weighs about 10lbs, you could get away with a smaller electric motor of about 800 watts which would probably fit between the bearers. In short, there is no such thing as an "electric only" ARTF Senior Telemaster, you may fit either a glow motor or an electric motor. It was the six-foot ARTF, the Electro, which was only available solely as an electric powered model but at least one of my customers has converted his to glow! At present the Electro is not listed on the Hobby-Lobby website. When I checked with Hobby-Lobby last week, they had a few yellow STMs in stock which they were selling at a discount because some parts of the models had been finished in different shades of yellow. This would not affect their flying characteristics of course.

The plan of the Senior Telemaster builder's kit only shows the installation of a two-stroke glow motor but it would be a simple exercise to fit an electric motor on a commercial stand-off mount, or on a ply-wood box, or on threaded rods as I have done with the ARTF.

As for suitable engines, I have flown the Senior Telemasters with three different glow motors: an old Merco 61, an old OS FS 61 fourstroke and a rather more modern Thunder Tiger 91FS. The Thunder Tiger works best and the old OS barely flew it at all, every take-off was a bit like the Spirit of St Louis! A 70-80FS would be nice and as for the model being difficult to fly in a strong wind, any lightly loaded model will be blown around in a wind and prove to be a bit of a handful for a novice. Best not to fly in a wind until you know what you're doing.

Finally, the Precedent T240 features the original German Senior Telemaster four-spar wing with inset ailerons, the so-called "barn door wing." It also uses the same tailplane as the STM. I believe that many years ago, SLEC, a company which owns the Precedent brand had a license to make the Senior Telemaster and to sell it in Europe. This was probably before Hobby-Lobby took over the production rights. The T240 is a much heavier model than a Senior Telemaster because its liteply fuselage measures 13" x 7.5" at its maximum girth (33cms x 19cms) whereas the STM is a much more sveldte 7.5" x 4.5" and is made up largely of balsa strip. My T240 flies nicely on a 91 FS but you could fit a much larger engine under that voluminous cowl.

A year or two back SLEC were selling the T240 kit for £165, about $256 US, but it no longer features on their website. I'll check to see whether it's currently available even if it means losing the sale of a few STMs!

Happy Landings