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• throw weight
  throw weight

  noun

  the lifting power, or payload maximum, of a ballistic missile exclusive of the weight of the rocket itself, and including the weight of the warhead or warheads and of guidance and penetration systems; ballistic delivery power.
• throw-weight
  throw-weight

  The size of the nuclear warhead or set of warheads that a missile, such as a ballistic missile, can carry. A nation might make up for the inaccuracy of its missiles by increasing their throw-weight.

throw weight

American  

[throh weyt] / ˈθroʊ ˌweɪt /

Or throwweight

noun

1. the lifting power, or payload maximum, of a ballistic missile exclusive of the weight of the rocket itself, and including the weight of the warhead or warheads and of guidance and penetration systems; ballistic delivery power.

   larger Russian missiles with a throw weight of up to 20 megatons.

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throw weight British  

noun

1. the maximum weight of supplementary mechanisms that can be lifted by the boost stages of a particular missile

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throw-weight Cultural  

1. The size of the nuclear warhead or set of warheads that a missile, such as a ballistic missile, can carry. A nation might make up for the inaccuracy of its missiles by increasing their throw-weight.

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Etymology

Origin of throw weight

First recorded in 1965–70

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

throw weight throw-weight

“This is a very tough and very emotional issue, so there’s some different points of view. I get it. But if you look at where the throw weight is, there is a significant bipartisan majority.”

From Washington Times ● Oct. 27, 2023

As long as there are enough amateur investors to throw weight around, they can decide whether a stock moves up or down.

From Slate ● Jan. 26, 2021

The book is another way to throw weight into sound.

From The New Yorker ● Apr. 19, 2019

And in this case, the league showed that it understands the difference between power for a purpose, and power to just throw weight around.

From Washington Post ● Sep. 23, 2017

The animal may show a certain reluctance to throw weight on the limb when turned to the right or left.

From Common Diseases of Farm Animals by R. A. Craig, D.V.M.

Did bad reviews — or, more to the point, their cumulative throw-weight on such aggregation sites as Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic — sink those movies?

From Washington Post ● Aug. 3, 2017

But when that fails, writing regulations “is a way to get much more substantial throw-weight behind solving the problem.”

From New York Times ● Aug. 13, 2016

In other words, he can match her super PAC’s throw-weight with less than half the money.

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 4, 2016

The State Department believed it had, in Burt's phrase, "neutralized the throw-weight boys."

From Time Magazine Archive

So do multiple warheads that are clustered on top of missiles with particularly powerful lifting capability, known as "throw-weight."

From Time Magazine Archive