Booting off external hd.

So i must admit im a pc user but a friend asked me to try to fix their mac book.
I have never had a mac and honestly have little clue at what im doing.
(mac does not have warranty)

I am trying to reinstall the os
So this is my problem the cd drive on the macbook is busted. I have the (mac os x tiger cd), but i dont have a mac to create the bootable usb harddrive like a lot of sites suggest.

Is there any way i can somehow make a bootable hd under windows or i also have fedora installed on this machine ( doolboot )

Thanx for any help

forgot to add i cant use the mac to make the hd ( would be easy ) but the problem is it keeps going to sleep. Iv read Oh so many forum posts about it and some people say its software others hard. So im trying to see if the logic board is done for or if its the software messing it up. (then its time to get new laptop for black friday )

I don't know what you have tried, but here are a few steps you should try. There can be many causes, such as overheating, faulty hardware, corrupted preferences, etc.
Since you don't have a working disc drive, the first step would be to repair disk permissions.
Then go through the link, and if that fails, follow the steps I have placed below.
http://www.mac-forums.com/forums/os-x-operating-system/93819-basic-os-x-mac-troubleshooting.html

Delete Playlist:

go to Macintosh HD in finder window
> Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration

delete com.apple.PowerManagement.plist

Restart Mac, and go to system preferences, energy saver, and reset the sleep settings.

Reset PMU:

First quit all of your active applications and shut down your Mac. Once the Mac has completely shut down, unplug the power adapter and remove the MacBook battery. Press and hold the power button for at least five seconds and release. Now reinstall the battery, with the MacBook still powered down plug back in the power adapter and restart your MacBook. Quite a few of your setting will have been set back to their default, so sleep time, backlighting and a few other options will have to be adjusted to your liking.

Sorry i guess i should have went into a lot more detail. Long day so was not thinking.

Problem is The system is putting itself to sleep as soon as its booted up. It actually seems kind of random sometimes it ill flash the screen (bright ) and other times its got the backlight off )
The more i think about it the more im starting to think its a hardware issue.
I have tried deleting the power management file. Reseting the pmu
Also sometimes i get a good 1 -2 min of working time (not lately) but the temp seemed to be around 50-60 F . so i dont think its a heat issue .
Just very irritating how it keeps going to sleep. I looked at the system log , it did not have any issues just kept repeating system sleep and put itself to sleep

so took out the sleep sensor/bat connector now. It had corrosion on it . But even with it out its still going to sleep

Without the disc drive working.... I would recommend an external disc drive, but you won't have any success if you cant keep the mac awake to do the install, much as if you had an external HD with the OS X.
I would try a safe start and see if it boots (hold the shift key down as soon as you hear the tone).

ohh guess the sensor needed to be plugged in . cleaned away the corrosion and laptop has booted up wonderfully

EDIT: ty for the wonderfull suggestions 6string, just somehow i got led a differnt way then i thought it would take to fix the problem

LOL, and glad to hear.... amazing how simple the fix right under our noses can be!

Great time, to create a back up, and a bootable backup, and perhaps, get a new disc drive as well.