footplate
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: 1.69 in modern English
14
Scrabble Score
9
Letters
2
Syllables
7
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
The metal plate which forms the base platform of a steam locomotive and supports the boiler and the driver's cab, particularly in the United Kingdom.
noun
The part of a roller skate that attaches to the boot.
noun
A timber in a wood frame that distributes a concentrated load.
noun
A platform on which the driver's foot rests but which, unlike a pedal, has no effect.
verb
To travel (or work) on the footplate of a locomotive.
Example Sentences
- "Unlike the earlier standard designs, in which the whole of the footplate was on the engine, fall plates are re-introduced and these are hinged from the front of the tender to rest on the rearward extension of the cab floor."
- "All the same, nearly eight hours on the footplate covering a distance of 320 miles, with an ambient temperature of up to 103° for much of the time, proved an ordeal which I would not lightly undertake again."
- "After a while we left the engine, but not before André had examined the 4-6-4 very carefully, with hammer and torch, both outside and underneath. And that was the end of my footplate work on this particular weekend."
- "This uncoupling done, Gimbert opened the regulator as Nightall climbed back onto the footplate, in order to pull the one burning wagon away from the rest of the bomb-laden train."
- "Kit had fallen into conversation with a footplate man who was deadheading back out to Samarkand, where he lived with his wife and children."
- "The footplate of the stapes develops and ossifies in conjunction with the otic capsule and thus takes its origin from the otic placode in the embryo."
Etymology
Inflected Forms
footplates (plural)
footplates (present, singular)
footplating (participle, present)
footplated (participle, past)
footplated (past)