[youtube]http://youtu.be/HTlwORrp_WA[/youtube]

Other than the occasional Nerf gun, we tend to be a weapons-free household. And yet, when I heard about a new book from No Starch Press that focuses solely on crafting heavy weaponry out of Lego bricks, I wanted to share it here on GeekMom. Not because of the topic – the guns actually make me a little uncomfortable – but because of the author.

Jack Streat was just 16 years old when No Starch Press spotted his automated Lego weapons on YouTube and approached him about writing the book that would ultimately become Lego Heavy Weapons. He became a published author at the age of 17 when the book was released in May.

I recently asked Jack some questions about his work with No Starch Press, his building process, and his plans for the future.

Kris Bordessa: No Starch Press approached you about writing a book based on your building skills. Was your lack of experience at writing a book ever an issue? Did you have to convince them that you were capable of handling both the design and the text?

Jack Streat: I think they were actually a little surprised with the amount [of text] I sent over when we first started working on the textual side of the book! The amount I actually wrote got cut down quite a lot (although this was mostly due to re-writing on my part, as opposed to No Starch cutting chunks out). When talking/writing about subjects I know a fair bit about, I tend to just spool out information, as my family knows all too well from dinner time conversations... but I think things went fairly smoothly with the writing side of the book (in fact the whole book went fairly smoothly), and I think in the end my editor's work was more to do with just improving my phrasing and such. It was actually quite fun sitting down in the evening and churning away at the computer to come away that night with a first draft for an intro [to] one of the guns!

KB: Do you feel like writing out step-by-step instructions has helped you become a better communicator in the real world?

JS: Interesting question - probably not, really. The instructions in the book are very picture-based, so all I really had to do was work out [the steps] and also if it was the best angle for viewing them. Communication in the real world is of course mostly by language, so there's not much of an overlap. There were occasional descriptive paragraphs to accompany images, and I'll admit that there were definately times when it took maybe four or five drafts of a description before I was happy that it was vaguely comprehensible. I'd say that while it may have improved my communication a little, mostly it's made me even more appreciative of the phrase "a picture paints a thousand words!"

KB: You say in the book that you spend roughly an equal amount of time thinking about a project and actually building it. Can you give us an idea how much time in all is invested in creating a new model?

JS: Many of my guns (throughout my life, not just in the book) were built over a weekend - I'd maybe have an idea during the week, think it over in bed as I went to sleep, and then come Saturday morning I'd start building, having figured/solved out the most obvious design problems in the previous nights. There would still be many, many more problems to sort out, and those would be the ones that would leave me sitting on the floor, looking at what I had built so far and trying to work out what to do. Usually I'd be finished around Sunday mid-afternoon, after having built solidly (quite literally - there were many times where the only times I got up off the floor were for meal-times) all Saturday and Sunday morning. Then I might spend the rest of that afternoon sorting out what I was going to upload to the internet (pictures, videos etc), unless I was sick to death of the model by then, in which case I might do that on the Monday after school... so in all I'd say a pretty good estimate would be two full days' work.

KB: It sounds like you've taught yourself much of what you know about building with Lego bricks. Does the idea of following a passion and thus learning about it spill over into other aspects of your life?

JS: Well I also play guitar - and as a result of having a mechanically inclined mind I've spent a lot of time reading up on the different ways in which they're assembled, and how the particular moving parts work. I've actually modified a few of my own guitars, mostly involving the floating bridge sections (the 'whammy bar' parts), and have been very pleased with the results.

KB: Which came first: A passion for guns or a passion for mechanizing?

JS: Mechanizing - before I started uploading to MOCpages, I built many robots and other mechanical creations, and posted them on Lego's own NXTlog. These included things like remote control cars (complete with suspension, working gearboxes, etc.), bipedal walking robots. and a few gadgets that improved the NXT's functionality by, for example, allowing two motors to separately control many more than two outputs.

KB: Has the publication of this book spurred an interest in writing another? What's next for you?

JS: (Haha) Well that would be nice! But I'm just about to head off to university, so any more publication ventures would have to happen well after that. I still have a couple of mechanism ideas floating around in the back of my head, but I have no idea whether I'll ever even build them in the first place, let alone make instructions for them.

Lego Heavy Weapons includes detailed instructions for building four working models: a Desert Eagle handgun, an AKS-74U assault rifle, a bolt-action LeeEnfield rifle, and a SPAS combat shotgun. The book is heavy on graphics, making it ideal for builders who would like to replicate Jack's models or learn a bit more about creating mechanisms with Lego bricks. You can keep up with Jack Streat's latest projects on his YouTube channel or via MOC pages.

No Starch Press provided an electronic copy of this book for review purposes.