Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun An attachment to a magazine firearm which enables the soldier to use it as a single-loader and reserve the cartridges in the magazine.
  • noun In forestry, an artificial channel by which the course of a stream is straightened to facilitate log-driving.
  • noun The practice of stopping or cutting off the admission of motor-fluid, such as steam, to the engine-cylinder before the traverse of the piston is completed.
  • noun A partition or plate in a valve-chest having one or more ports controlled, as to opening and closure, by a cut-off valve.
  • noun That which cuts off or shortens, as a short path or cross-cut. Specifically
  • noun In steam-engines, a contrivance for cutting off the passage of steam from the steamchest to the cylinder, when the piston has made a part of its stroke, leaving the rest of the stroke to be accomplished by the expansive force of the steam already in the cylinder. It economizes steam, and thus saves fuel. See governor.
  • noun A new and shorter channel formed for a river by the waters cutting off or across an angle or bend in its course.
  • noun A slide in a delivery-spout in grain-elevators, etc., for shutting off the flow.—5. An arm on a reaper designed to support the falling grain while the platform is being cleared.—6. In plumbing, a connecting pipe.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun That which cuts off or shortens, as a nearer passage or road.
  • noun The valve gearing or mechanism by which steam is cut off from entering the cylinder of a steam engine after a definite point in a stroke, so as to allow the remainder of the stroke to be made by the expansive force of the steam already let in. See Expansion gear, under Expansion.
  • noun Any device for stopping or changing a current, as of grain or water in a spout.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun Alternative spelling of cutoff.
  • adjective Having had shirt sleeves or pantlegs shortened by cutting material from the end.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective detached by cutting
  • verb remove by or as if by cutting
  • verb cease, stop
  • verb remove surgically
  • verb cut off and stop
  • verb break a small piece off from
  • verb make a break in
  • noun a route shorter than the usual one
  • noun a device that terminates the flow in a pipe
  • noun a designated limit beyond which something cannot function or must be terminated

Etymologies

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