braking
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brake 1
(brāk)n.
1. A device for slowing or stopping motion, as of a vehicle, especially by contact friction.
2. Something that slows or stops action.
v. braked, brak·ing, brakes
v.tr.
To reduce the speed of with or as if with a brake.
v.intr.
1. To operate or apply a brake.
2. To be slowed or stopped by or as if by the operation of a brake.
[Early Modern English brake, bridle, curb (for a horse), perhaps from Middle Dutch or Middle Low German, nose ring, curb, flax brake; see brake2.]
brake 2
(brāk)n.
1. A toothed device for crushing and beating flax or hemp.
2. A heavy harrow for breaking clods of earth.
3. An apparatus for kneading large amounts of dough.
4. A machine for bending and folding sheet metal.
tr.v. braked, brak·ing, brakes
1. To crush (flax or hemp) in a toothed device.
2. To break up (clods of earth) with a harrow.
[Middle English, from Middle Dutch, from Middle Low German; see bhreg- in Indo-European roots.]
brake 3
(brāk)n.
A lever or handle on a machine such as a pump.
[Middle English, from Old French brac, from oblique form of bras, arm; see bracer2.]
brake 4
(brāk)n.
1. Any of various ferns of the genus Pteris having pinnately compound leaves and including several popular houseplants.
2. Any of certain other ferns, such as bracken.
[Middle English, probably back-formation from braken; see bracken.]
brake 5
(brāk)n.
An area overgrown with dense brushwood, briers, and undergrowth; a thicket.
[Middle English, from Middle Low German; see bhreg- in Indo-European roots.]
brake 6
(brāk)n. also break
A high horse-drawn carriage with four wheels.
v. Archaic
A past tense of break.
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
braking
(ˈbreɪkɪŋ)n
(Automotive Engineering)
a. the act or process of slowing or stopping a vehicle, wheel, shaft, etc, or for keeping it stationary, esp by means of friction
b. (as modifier): a braking system.
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