I am very pleased with this book. It gives very simple instructions for some very exciting "science projects" and even explains the theories that make these things work. Very fun for father and son time in the garage.

Do you have children? Do you have nephews? Do you have friends with kids? Are you ok with possibly angering your neighbors? Then this is the book for you. This book is full of the kind of stuff that we all took a shot at when we were younger (only this book shows you a safer way to do it).
This book is a great way to get kids away from the TV and out into the yard. It will even show them that science (at least experimentation) can be fun.
I have done several of the projects in this book, and it brought back a lot of memories, and made some new ones. There is nothing better than a cheering 11 year old after you hurl a pumpkin down the street with a catapult.
So, get this book, pick a project, and relive your childhood (and enhance someone else's.)

This is one dads and boys will get a kick out of together. The text is easy and enjoyable (even for mom) to read. Whether you are using it for science or history (making sort-of replicas or understanding the technology of certain periods) or for your budding engineer, you will find this a great place to start.

If you are an advanced ballistician (or whatever you call yourselves), check this out at the library first - it really is a beginner's book. Also, redstoneprojects.com has a nice selection of working replica and/or tabletop model catapults from different historical eras if you're more interested in authenticity.

Depending on the kids' ages, you will probably want to be sure they understand these are not projects to do alone in their spare time but rather with an adult present (yes, dad counts). Our son is permitted to work on parts gathering & building on his own but knows "ground zero" is a family affair. Your kids might be different - read it yourself first, and you'll see what I mean.

Yes, it's dangerous (you can tell by the title & cover art) - but so is life! Have fun!

This book I had as a child and can't find it so we wanted to get it for our 11 year old son's birthday. Lots of fun science experiments - we will have fun!

Some of the stuff in here is dangerous, but kids will never respect danger if they don't experience a little firsthand. The projects in the book are a lot of fun and can teach you a lot about physics and chemistry.

This book seems to be a common book for the men in my life, old and young. It provides the basics on items that guys enjoy learning about and gets the creative ideas flowing into more research and "improvements." This would make a good gift for any guy that enjoys a good "boom!" Note to wives: Trips to hardware store are going to happen. While there, grab eye and ear protection for your kids. They'll enjoy getting into the fun of the learning in the projects.

This book seems to be a common book for the men in my life, old and young. It provides the basics on items that guys enjoy learning about and gets the creative ideas flowing into more research and "improvements." This would make a good gift for any guy that enjoys a good "boom!" Note to wives: Trips to hardware store are going to happen. While there, grab eye and ear protection for your kids. They'll enjoy getting into the fun of the learning in the projects.

Very smooth transaction. Extremely prompt. Will definately buy from this seller again! A+

Nothing particularly creative in that book that anybody with some common sense wouldn't come up with.

Being a parent and a science teacher, I really love this book. It takes me back to my younger years when it was fun to launch anything more than 10 feet and still have all of your hair intact. What fun this book is! Gurstelle is great!

This an entertaing book. It would be excellent for anyone with kids. If more children and parents worked on these fun projects the kids would get an education, get out of the house and away from Video Games.

This an entertaing book. It would be excellent for anyone with kids. If more children and parents worked on these fun projects the kids would get an education, get out of the house and away from Video Games.

This an entertaing book. It would be excellent for anyone with kids. If more children and parents worked on these fun projects the kids would get an education, get out of the house and away from Video Games.

My 15 yr. old son loves this book and quickly put together the Tennis Ball Mortar. Not sure if this stuff is legal in all places and it definitely requires adult supervision.

This book provides for a lot of fun. I worked on a couple of projects with my kids. They turned out well. As with anything like this adult supervision is necessary.

We have tried the tennis ball cannon from this book so far and had great success with it. It was a great weekend project that was cheap and easy with great results. Great for summer time fun with the kids.

My 15 yr. old son loves this book and quickly put together the Tennis Ball Mortar. Not sure if this stuff is legal in all places and it definitely requires adult supervision.

This book provides for a lot of fun. I worked on a couple of projects with my kids. They turned out well. As with anything like this adult supervision is necessary.

Great little project book. My 12 year old boy could not put it down. It gets to the little boy in us all. Who doesnt love launching potatoes at 200 fps by the combustion products of hair spray. A good how to primer, yet safe enough for young teens, with a little adult oversite. This would be a great stocking stuffer for boys 10 to 20.

This book reminds me of a book of science experiments I had as a boy, but these projects are a whole lot more interesting than many of the ones in that old book. Looking forward to trying some of these out with the grandkids one of these days.

Silly me, I used Ether starting fluid in my first potato cannon. That is downright dangerous. But this was prior to having a nicely written book with several projects that I didn't even think of. I haven't tried any of these projects yet, but they have been carefully thought out with safety in mind. The author also gives interesting backgrounds to the projects. I wouldn't want to be "hoisted with my own petard" as Shakespeare wrote. I'm going to wait till winter with a snow cover before attempting the fire kite. Great stuff! I recommend this.

Great for dad's to indulge their childhood daydreams whilst spending time with their kids.

very interesting--shows some of the ways we entertained ourselves before computers and play stations.

i have only tryed a few of the things in heer, but they work great! the potato cannon actually launches the potato like 150-200 yards! a mighty exellent book.

There are some cool projects here, especially for people that like to make a lot of noise. BOOM!!

By doing these projects with one's children one can teach them
engineering, mechanical, planning and fabrication skills as well as how to see through a project that may take a few days instead of 15 minutes. Their interest in the projects will
be maintained by the fascinating science as well as the impressive results.

I found this book to be quite informative and helpful on building many fun ballistic devices. The chapters on the spud gun and back porch rocketry were probably my favorites. For anyone who grew up constructing innovative (but highly unsafe) projectile launchers and wants to create something the neighbors can appreciate, this book is for you!
I would also like to emphasize that GIRLS, as well as boys, can and will enjoy this book.

I found this book to be quite informative and helpful on building many fun ballistic devices. The chapters on the spud gun and back porch rocketry were probably my favorites. For anyone who grew up constructing innovative (but highly unsafe) projectile launchers and wants to create something the neighbors can appreciate, this book is for you!
I would also like to emphasize that GIRLS, as well as boys, can and will enjoy this book.

This book is a lot of fun. The projects are things that you can do safely, and that kids really like. I just wish the author had put a little more work into it. Some of the history doesn't seem accurate, and the physics should be explained more clearly. More effort on content and less on strange facts would help.

Building the onager (torsion catapult), I had to change most of the dimensions. The book calls for 1"x1" wood, but that's hard to find. 1x2 (nominal) is easy to find, but is 3/4" by 1 1/2". A book for quick projects should use 1x2s, not some mythical 1" square lumber. The drawings were incomplete. Between the drawings and the photo it was possible to get the whole thing together, but I had to change most of the dimensions. Why he uses 1/8" dowel is beyond me. Even 3/16" broke too easily.

Overall, interesting and certainly fun, but I wish it were done more carefully.

This is the sort of book I'd ordinarily be eager to read. I got a chance to look through it at a local bookstore, however, and found it a great disappoinment. I didn't think most of the projects were all that interesting.

But what really clinched my decision not to buy this book was a chapter in which the author claimed that Belisarius, perhaps the most famous Byzantine general, invented both the cataphract and Greek Fire. What a crock! Greek Fire is said to have been invented by one Callinicus, a Syrian engineer, in the seventh century (673 A.D.). Belisarius lived over a century earlier,
500? - 565 A.D. Similarly, cataphracts were developed by the Parthians much earlier, possibly even in the last century B.C.,
depending upon your definition of what constitutes a cataphract.

Five minutes searching the Internet suffices to demonstrate this, but apparently the author couldn't be bothered. When an author demonstrates such truly monumental ignorance it makes me question everything else they have to say.

I'm also stunned at the other reviewers who complimented this book for its digressions into history when the author gets so much wrong.

This is one of those ultimate guy books, fun for boys 8 to 80. It brought back memories of building similar devices in my youth, although I never built anything close to the diverse collection the author has brought together and describes in this interesting book. The book contains instructions and even troubleshooting suggestions for 12 different projects, ranging from a potato canon to Greek fire to the dry-cleaner bag balloon. I remember using a compound called Bangsite 40 years ago when I was a boy that was probably calcium carbide to build a primitive canon, and he was a similar one here.

In addition to all the projects, the author does a fine job of providing a little education on the fine points of the history of many of these devices, and on some of the most important inventors in history. There are briref but very readable articles on Archimedes, Robert H. Goddard (the "father of rocketry"), Alfred Nobel, and others.

A particularly interesting section is the one on the history of the catapult. The author details its use from 400 B.C. to the 15th century. For example, we learn that last successful use of the catapult (before it was replaced by canon) was at the Battle of Rhodes in 1480, and that 500 A.D. is the earliest recorded use of gravity-powered catapults or trebouchets in the Middle East. In 1191 Richard I (the "Lion-Hearted") participated in a hard-fought battle between the Franks and the Turks in which they battered each other with 300 catapults. And torsion engines were in widespread use in the Roman army by 50 A.D. In 1450, the canon supplanted the catapult throughout Europe and its long use in warfare came to an end.

There are also interesting articles on The Roman Candle, the Medieval Crossbow, and Secret Weapons (such as missiles and rockets). At 170 pages in medium-size format, there are a lot of interesting historical facts and information in addition to all the material on the projects. This is a great idea for a book and I'm surprised no-one has ever done it before.

Definitely fun projects for guys! If you feel like blowing something up, but still want to be safe, this is for you!

Being an avid potato gunner, I picked this book up at the local library, and after reading it over, I just had to to get it. The book will please everyone thats into building fun projects during the lazy summer days & will provide enjoyment for hours! The book goes into very good detail with each project & stresses safety as a key thing, which is good because the projects in this book can be somewhat dangeroeus ONLY if you don't follow instructions & use common sense. I recommended this book to anyone in need for a good project to work on or just for fun! Definitly on my top 10 list.

This book is a wonderful resource for those boys who have graduated from Nerf and waterguns- and for those of us that never will. What struck me most was the sheer variety of projects in this book- from little rockets powered by a match(!) to monster potato guns, this book has everything. I built a potato gun similar to the one in this book several years ago, and have been looking for projects in the same vein. With this book, I've found them. I especially love the fact that he uses a variety of power sources- the traditional hair spray of the potato gun, air pressure, even chemical combustion.

One of the unique things about this book, as compared to other similar books, is the emphasis on both safety and history. Safety is important for obvious reasons. But most readers are enthusiasts about this sort of stuff, and the history lessons are exciting.

My only complaint is that there is no room in this book for any sort of modification to the designs. For example, there are formulas that can be used to determine the maximum chamber size for a PVC-constructed potato gun, and with this, you can design your own potato gun in relative safety. Unfortunately, the author insists that you stick strictly to his designs. This appears to be an effort to ensure that all of the "toys" created with his book are safe, so that's only a minor complaint.

Can't wait to start lobbing tennis balls!

This is a great book. Just from skimming through it you can tell that a lot of thought and precaution went into it's construction. Parents may be scared seeing a book like this in the hands of their child, but don't be frightened. Most of the projects in here are pretty innocuous and saftey is paramount. The book and author STRESS proper precautions and advise saftey gear for any dangerous experiments. If you have a kid who has been playing with fire, been showing a disturbing interest in explosives or such, then buy them this book and do these projects with them! It will give kids a productive, educational and supervised outlet for these curiosities and fascinations and will give you a chance to teach them a bit about physics and further bond with them. Some young pyros grow into arsonists, others grow into firemen and physicists... you make the choice! Instead of punishing them and trying to curb their interest in such things, channel this energy into something positive.

From the perspective of an adult or adolesent this book is still great. Fun projects and lots of information make for a fun read, and an even more fun summer project. Science teachers and the like will love this book as some of these projects could prove wonderful classroom demonstrations to aid in teaching and more importantly, in getting kids' attention and perhaps sparking an interest.

Great book. more stuff like this might help the curb effects of all the negative stuff out there like the Anarchist's Cookbook and all those [explosive] websites.

A big five stars!

What a wonderful boys book--boys from 9 to 90 will get a bang out of these projects. The author presents enough safety information to be reasonable, and mixes in scientific explanations, a bit of math, and interesting anectdotes that take us back into the history of ballistics. But most of all, he presents details plans and parts lists (including sources for hard to find parts) to build things that shoot up into the air, things that go "BOOM," and other cool stuff like fire kites.

Many of the projects described here are also well documented on the internet. But most internet postings have little to say about safety, science, or history. Using this book as a starting point, and the internet as a resource to expand the ideas, could lead one to develop a truly interesting ballistic arsenal indeed!!

Before we had homeland security to worry about, this might have been a good source book for a science fair. Now, it just might be a great way to spend a lifetime behind bars. But, if you're in touch with your inner Goddard, von Braun, or just love the idea of a tennis ball mortar ... then this is the book for you!

This is a great resource book for pyromaniacs who want to expand their horizons.

The highlight of this book is the chapter on the venerated potato cannon (a.k.a. spud gun). The author presents a simple yet effective design and gives detailed instructions on how to construct it. I have seen a number of designs on the web, and I prefer this for it parsimonious design. I have "launched" a number of spuds with this cannon, and am perfectly pleased with its operation.

Other projects include back porch rocketry (the paper match rocket, the hydro pump rocket, and the pneumatic missile), the Cincinnati fire kite, the Greek fire and the catapult, the tennis ball mortar, the flinger, Pnewton's petard, the dry cleaning bag balloon, the carbide cannon, and the ballistic pendulum.

The book is clearly written and illustrated (with drawings and black and white photographis). It contains a number of history vignettes along with some illustrations of ancient weapons. The remaining chapter includes some ideas for further study.

While I highly recommend this book, please note that some of these projects (most notably the potato gun) are illegal in some states. In that case, this book would be for "reference" only.