Search the Dictionary

The heel of a rudder.

; as, strength and agility of body. They . . . trust to the agility of their wit. Bacon. Wheeling with the agility of a hawk. Sir W. Scott.

By the length; in a line with the length; lengthwise. Some laid along . . . on spokes of wheels are hung. Dryden.

A peculiar small siliceous spicule having a denticulated wheel at each end; -- found in freshwater sponges.

An axle or spindle of a wheel or opinion.

Consisting of arrows. How quick they wheeled, and flying, behind them shot Sharp sleet of arrowy showers. Milton.

s; obliquely; with a side glance; with disdain, envy, or suspicion. They dart away; they wheel askance. Beattie. My palfrey eyed them askance. Landor. Both . . . were viewed askance by authority. Gladstone.

; -- called also axis band, axial fiber, and cylinder axis. -- Axis in peritrochio, the wheel and axle, one of the mechanical powers. -- Axis of a curve (Geom.), a straight line which bisects a system of parallel chords of a curve; called a principal axis, when cutting them at right angles, in which case it divides t…

The pin or spindle on which a wheel revolves, or which revolves with a wheel.

A bushing in the hub of a wheel, through which the axle passes.

A bar or beam of wood or iron, connecting the opposite wheels of a carriage, on the ends of which the wheels revolve.

A board attached to the rim of a water wheel to prevent the water from running off the floats or paddies into the interior of the wheel. W. Nicholson.

The distance through which one part of connected machinery, as a wheel, piston, or screw, can be moved without moving the connected parts, resulting from looseness in fitting or from wear; also, the jarring or reflex motion caused in badly fitting machinery by irregularities in velocity or a reverse of motion.…

Water thrown back by the turning of a waterwheel, or by the paddle wheels of a steamer.

To cause to undergo a disgraceful punishment, as a recreant knight. [Obs.] He by the heels him hung upon a tree, And baffled so, that all which passed by The picture of his punishment might see. Spenser.

A balance wheel, as of a watch, or clock. See Balance wheel (in the Vocabulary).

nd saw, a saw in the form of an endless steel belt, with teeth on one edge, running over wheels.

The part of the crust of a horse's hoof which is bent inwards towards the frog at the heel on each side, and extends into the center of the sole.

To abrade or rub off any outer covering from; as to bark one's heel.

A machine, invented in the 17th century, worked by a form of reaction wheel. The water flows into a vertical tube and gushes from apertures in hollow horizontal arms, causing the machine to revolve on its axis.