Engineering Dictionary
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An alphabetical listing of General terms and items. |
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Mega; one million. When referring to memory capacity, two to the twentieth power (1,048,576 in decimal notation).
Provided with machicolations.
Battlements provided with machicolations.
A wall gallery situated at the corner of a fortification; usually provided with arrow slits, which added to the defensive capacity of the wall.
A gallery provided with machicolations, situated at the top of a curtain wall or just below the level of the wall walk, dating from the 14th century.
A gatehouse provided with machicolations. See gatehouse.
A turret which was built out on consoles, the holes between the consoles were used as machicolations. Also known as a bartizan or machicoulis. See flanking turret.
See machicolated battlements.
A series of openings provided by
(1) A single or a small number of machicolations, which was positioned over a gate, doorway or some other vulnerable angle of the defences. Developed as a substitute for the hourd as did the machicolation but served to provide particular defence of a position, an example is the box machicolation. See box machicolation. (2) Machicoulis were also used built around the angles of towers and curtain walls, often semi-circular in shape, known as bartizans, which were used to defend the area below as well as flanking the neighbouring positions. See bartizan, flanking turret. (3) A square aperture in the floor of the room above an entry, which was used to attack the enemy from above, usually covered by a trap door, and was known as a murder hole. (4) Machicoulis has also been used to refer to machicolation is some texts.
Instructions that are written in binary form that a computer can execute directly. Also called object code and object language.
The main line of defence or the crest of the scarp of a fortification. In drawings of fortifications it is usually drawn in a thicker line than the other lines.
The strongest building of a fortification, usually the keep.
The chief work of a fortification, as opposed to the outworks.
(1) A type of siege tower. (2) An earthwork fort or mound designed to be used to blockade the approaches to a fortification under siege.
An accurately machined shaft on which work is mounted for balancing.
See fortified manor.
The outer wall of a late medieval castle that was situated between the main curtain and the moat. (L. mantellum, cloak).
The adjustment on a proportioning controller which shifts the proportioning band in relationship to the set point to eliminate droop or offset errors.
The switch in a limit controller that manually resets the controller after the limit has been exceeded.
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A fortified hostel on the Iberian peninsula.
Small isolated fortification along the main roads for military traffic of Andalusia.
a building material such as stone, clay, brick, or concrete
Volumetric flowrate times density, i.e. pounds per hour or kilograms per minute.
A device like a disk or magtape that can store large amounts of data readily accessible to the central processing unit.
An Italian term meaning donjon or keep.
The barbican gatehouse used to defend the main access route of a Japanese castle, positioned at either the crossings of the inner, middle, or outer moats, or at the main entrance to the castle. The barbican gatehouse consisted of a walled square or rectangular courtyard provided with two gateways
The strain value where a deviation of more than 5% occurs with respect to the mean characteristic (diagram of resistance change vs strain).
The maximum value of excitation voltage or current that can be applied to the transducer at room conditions without causing damage or performance degradation beyond specified tolerances.
The much sought after ideal amount of flanking effect, which increases a fortifications defencibility.
The maximum temperature at which an instrument or sensor can be safely operated.
The maximum power in watts that a device can safely handle.
f = (f+n+f-n-)1/n
The average of the maximum and minimum temperature of a processequilibrium.
A physical quantity, property, or condition which is measured.
The thermocouple junction referred to as the hot junction that is used to measure an unknown temperature.
An engineer who applies the principles of mechanics and energy to the design of machines and devices
The difference of the indication with increasing and decreasing strain loading, at identical strain values of the specimen.
For solvents other than water the medium effect is the activity coefficient related to the standard state in water at zero concentration. It reflects differences in the electrostatic and chemical interactions of the ions with the molecules of various solvents. Solvation is the most significant interaction.
The temperature at which a substance transforms from a solid phase to a liquid phase.
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The pH-sensitive glass bulb is the membrane across which the potential difference due to the formation of double layers with ion-exchange properties on the two swollen glass surfaces is developed. The membrane makes contact with and separates the internal element and filling solution from the sample solution.
(1) The portion of a battlemented parapet that rises up from a wall (eg. the solid part of a parapet between the crenels). (2) The part of a parapet between two embrasures. See battlement, crenel, embrasure, guelph merlon, half merlon, irish battlement, parapet, stepped merlon, venetian battlement. (I. merlone, battlement).
An arrow slit which was situated in the centre of a merlon, the addition of the arrow slit added to the potential fire power of the wall head defences. They also provided better protection to the archers than firing through the crenels. See arrow slit, merlon.
A procedure whereby the mass distribution of a rotor is adjusted to reduce unbalance, or vibration due to unbalance, to an acceptable value. Corrections are usually made by adding material to, or removing it from, the rotor.
(1) Small loops through which the enemy could be attacked, usually situated in the gatehouse. Also known as murder holes and spy holes. See drop box, fall trap. (2) Small gun loops through which muskets could be fired at the enemy. See musket port.
A transparent mineral used as window material in high-temperature ovens.
One millionth of an ampere, 10-6 amps, A.
A computer which is physically small. It can fit on top of or under a desk; based on LSI circuitry, computers of this type are now available with much of the power currently associated with minicomputer systems.
One millionth of a meter, 10-6 meters.
One millionth of a volt, 10-6 volts.
A bailey which was situated between the outer and the inner bailey's of a castle. See bailey, concentric castle.
One thousandth of an inch (.001").
A Roman fort which was used to defend a part of a fortified perimeter (eg. Hadrian's Wall) situated every Roman mile along the length of the perimeter, (approximately every 1.5 kilometres). A mile castle was constructed on a rectangular plan covering 300 to 400 square metres, provided with a barrack-room, a store, an oven and a latrine. There were two gates; the inner leading to civilized lands while the outer was provided with turrets, and opened to the barbarian lands. Also known as a castellum.
One thousandth of an amp, 10-3 amps, symbol mA.
One thousandth of a meter, symbol mm.
Unit of electromotive force. It is the difference in potential required to make a current of 1 millampere flow through a resistance of 1 ohm; one thousandth of a volt, symbol mV.
(1) The works excavated by the besiegers to attack a fortifications defences by making a breach. The early method was to fill the excavated cavity under a wall with combustibles, set it a light, once the upright timbers burnt through the chamber collapsed bringing down the wall above, thus making a breach. The later method of using a mine to make a breach involved using gun powder, the gun powder was exploded in the excavated chamber under the walls, the resulting effects producing a breach. (2) Mines were made by besiegers while countermines were made by the besieged. See ecoutes.
A type of thermocouple cable which has an outer metal sheath and mineral (magnesium oxide) insulation inside separating a pair of thermocouple wires from themselves and from the outer sheath. This cable is usually drawn down to compact the mineral insulation and is available in diameters from .375 to .010 inches. It is ideally suited for high-temperature and severe-duty applications.
On an analog scale, the smallest indicated division of units on the scale.
A lesser work which was used to defend a position or a major work. See outwork, main work.
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A Japanese fortification consisting of a large earthen enbankment which was used as a dam to create a water defence against an attacking force. (J. water fort).
A water filled ditch which surrounded a castle, or just forming a line of defence, which was artificial or partly natural in origin. Just as donjonsignified the highest part of a motte and bailey castle and was later changed to dungeon, so moat was derived from motte or the mound to the ditch from which it was excavated. In some cases the word moat is used to refer to a dry ditch. (Fr. motte, mound).
A pier of rock set amid a moat or ditch which was used to support a wooden bridge or drawbridge. Common in the Middle East because of the lack of strong enough timber to span the whole moat. Some piers were left standing when the moat was hewn out of the solid rock. Also known as drawbridge pier.
Provided with a moat.
See blind machicolation, bracket, false machicolation.
Modulator/Demodulator. A device that transforms digital signals into audio tones for transmission over telephone lines, and does the reverse for reception.
A small flat bastion, usually situated in the middle of a overlong curtain, from which musketeers defended the neighbouring bastions with small shot flanking fire, otherwise the bastions would be inadequately defended due to their distance apart. (Fr. moineau, sparrow).
A measure of concentration expressed in mols per kilogram of solvent.
A gateway of a Japanese castle, which was of two main types; the gateway which was constructed of timber similar in style to a tenshu, and the other gateway was simpler and made into the stone walls or the ishigaki of a castle.
A dome composed of a series of arches, joined together with a series of horizontal rings called parallels
An ion with a single positive or negative charge (H+, C1-).
An outwork constructed in the form of a crescent. See demilune, ravelin.
A merlon which was typical of the fortified architecture, characterized by a pointed apex.
A natural, partly natural or artificial earthen mound surmounted by a wooden donjon surrounded by a palisade, and in turn surrounded by palisaded bailey or the bailey was placed to one side; the motte was usually surrounded by a ditch which was also surrounded the palisaded bailey. The motte and bailey were connected by a flying bridge. The motte and bailey castle was common in France and wasintroduced to England by the Normans, who used them to consolidate their territorial gains. See kernmotte.
The pc board of a computer that contains the bus lines and edge connectors to accommodate other boards in the system. In a microcomputer, the motherboard contains the microprocessor and connectors for expansion boards.
See bailey, motte.
The error resultant from installing the transducer, both electrical and mechanical.
A bridge in which the deck moves to clear a navigation channel; a swing bridge has a deck that rotates around a center point; a drawbridge has a deck that can be raised and lowered; a bascule bridge deck is raised with counterweights like a drawbridge; and the deck of a lift bridge is raised vertically like a massive elevator
The leftmost digit of the display.
A merlon which was built with a pointed apex, typical of mudejar fortified architecture. See moorish merlon, pointed merlon.
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A high-accuracy bridge configuration used to measure three-wire RTDthermometers.
A number lines of detached walls which were used to defend a position. See concentric castle, lines of defence (1).
A technique which allows different input (or output) signals to use the same lines at different times, controlled by an external signal. Multiplexing is used to save on wiring and I/O ports.
A hillfort which was surrounded by a number of ditches and ramparts, which were either built originally as a multivallate hillfort or had a number of ditches and ramparts added, thus a univallate or a bivallate hillfort could develop into a multivallate hillfort. This development in hillfort design was made necessary by the importation of the sling to Britain, the sling which had a longer range compared to that of the throwing spear. This made it necessary to keep the enemy further away from the principle defences, this was achieved by extending the outworks. This however, does not suggest that all univallate hillforts pre-date all multivallate hillforts. See hillforts.
A gallery constructed within the thickness of the wall below the parapet, which was provided with arrow slits. See firing gallery.
A tower attached to the curtain wall which was used for flanking the curtain wall. See bastion, curtain tower, wall tower. (L. murus, wall).
(1) An opening in the floor of the room of a gatehouse situated above the entry passage or in other important places, which was used to attack the enemy below. See drop box,
(2) The gaps of the machicolations which were used to attack the enemy at the base of a castles walls. See machicolation, murderess.
The square gun ports which were used in coastal artillery forts of the late 15th and early 16th century England.
The gap of a machicolation, which was used to attack the enemy at the base of the wall below. See machicolation, murder hole.
A port which was designed for the use of muskets, dating from the 16th century. Also called musket embrasures. See gun port.
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