rotor
Electricity. a rotating member of a machine.: Compare stator (def. 1).
Aeronautics. a system of rotating airfoils, as the horizontal ones of a helicopter or of the compressor of a jet engine.
any of a number of tall, cylindrical devices mounted on a special ship (rotor ship ) and rotated in such a way that the Magnus effect of wind impinging on the cylinders is used to drive and maneuver the vessel.
(in a self-winding watch) a weight eccentrically mounted on an arbor for keeping the mainspring wound.
Origin of rotor
1Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024
How to use rotor in a sentence
It had four rotors instead of the standard three, and unlike other machines they rotated randomly with no predictable pattern.
Week in Death: The Woman Who Cracked Hitler’s Codes | The Telegraph | November 17, 2013 | THE DAILY BEASTThe nose of the car swung east by south; the cold-jet rotors began humming and then the hot-jets were cut in.
Uller Uprising | Henry Beam Piper, John D. Clark and John F. CarrHe banked the copter and cut the jets; the rotors took over and gently lowered the craft to the distant landing field.
Starman's Quest | Robert SilverbergSomething was poised a dozen feet off the ground, a large, box-like object seven or eight feet across, rotors spinning above it.
Voyage To Eternity | Milton LesserThe rotors whirled a silver shield against the rain, the great drops splattering off the shield.
Prison of a Billion Years | C.H. Thames
This could be from a flame coming from jets on the tips of the rotors.
The Four-Faced Visitors of Ezekiel | Arthur W. Orton
British Dictionary definitions for rotor
/ (ˈrəʊtə) /
the rotating member of a machine or device, esp the armature of a motor or generator or the rotating assembly of a turbine: Compare stator
a device having blades radiating from a central hub that is rotated to produce thrust to lift and propel a helicopter
the revolving arm of the distributor of an internal-combustion engine
a violent rolling wave of air occurring in the lee of a mountain or hill, in which the air rotates about a horizontal axis
Origin of rotor
1Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
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