1905–10; < Latin dūr ( us ) hard + alumin(um)
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We first built a two-inch chamber of duralumin and glass, with a diaphragm, actuated by compressed air, which could fully expand the chamber in five thousandths of a second.
From Scientific American ● Jun. 28, 2012
German shells and bombs are made from Swedish steel, but airplanes are built of duralumin, a copper alloy of aluminum, which is extracted from bauxite.
From Time Magazine Archive
The school is in a mountain-surrounded piece of desert, hot enough to fry the traditional egg on a glider's duralumin fuselage.
From Time Magazine Archive
He fitted himself with a pair of four-pound, duralumin, flexible-jointed legs designed by the brothers Desoutter, one of whom also lost a limb in an air crash.
From Time Magazine Archive
During the war two plants were put up in the vicinity of Friedrichshafen for making duralumin materials such as angle bars, strips, all kinds of girders, and other parts of the Zeppelin skeleton.
From Zeppelin The Story of a Great Achievement by Vissering, Harry
One day last week seven tons of Duralumin "tractor," driven by a twelve-cylinder automobile engine, chugged into the surf of Guantanamo Bay and set out to sea.
From Time Magazine Archive
Few sculptors can fashion of gleaming marble, glistening Duralumin and mellow bronze images of such refreshing purity as Hajdu.
From Time Magazine Archive
The whole engine-and-pylon assembly might have to be redesigned and manufactured with strengthened chrome steel, Duralumin and stainless steel fittings.
From Time Magazine Archive
The Duralumin, too, is carved rather than welded or hammered.
From Time Magazine Archive
Duralumin is composed of about 85 per cent. of aluminum, 5 per cent. of copper, 5 per cent. of zinc and 2 per cent. of tin.
From Creative Chemistry Descriptive of Recent Achievements in the Chemical Industries by Slosson, Edwin E.
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
