put-put

American  

[puht-puht, -puht] / ˈpʌtˈpʌt, -ˌpʌt /

Or putt-putt

noun

1. the sound made by a small internal-combustion engine or imitative of its operation.

2. Informal. a small internal-combustion engine, or something, as a boat or model airplane, equipped with one.

   the sound of distant put-puts on the lake.

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verb (used without object)

put-putted, put-putting

1. Informal. to operate with sounds suggesting a put-put, as a small motor or motor-driven device.

put-put British  

/ ˈpʌtˌpʌt /

noun

1. a light chugging or popping sound, as made by a petrol engine

2. a vehicle powered by an engine making such a sound

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verb

1. (intr) to make or travel along with such a sound

Etymology

Origin of put-put

First recorded in 1900–05; imitative

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

put-put put-putted put-putting

Leonard Smith of the New York Evening Post and Alfred H. Kerchhofer of the Buffalo Evening News canoed, capsized, found the lake waters icy, heard the rescuing put-put of several motor boats.

From Time Magazine Archive

The gentle climate, only slightly exaggerated by Sir Walter, woos people from TV tube and typewriter to putter and put-put, field and stream.

From Time Magazine Archive

Half a million Honda, Yamaha and Suzuki motor bikes put-put along South Viet Nam's roads, and little Sony radios are to be seen everywhere.

From Time Magazine Archive

The put-put goes out and the battery is very low.

From Time Magazine Archive

There could be no mistaking the put- put-put of a single cylinder motor boat.

From Boy Scouts of the Air on Lost Island by Stuart, Gordon

Then the Amberjack II put-putted through the Annisquam Canal to miss rough water off Cape Ann and sailed on to Little Harbor, N. H. for the night.

From Time Magazine Archive

Another former TVAer described Remington as a half-baked young radical who affected old shoes tied together with strings and put-putted around Knoxville on a motorcycle.

From Time Magazine Archive

Through bad, murky weather, all mist and fog, they put-putted southward across little ponds and up small streams.

From Time Magazine Archive

To surrender to the Germans, four couriers chug-chugged by motorboat to the Greek mainland, put-putted by motorcycle to Yanina in Epirus, where their conquerors waited.

From Time Magazine Archive

Gilly wiped silendy while her grandmother nervously put-putted on and on.

From "The Great Gilly Hopkins" by Katherine Paterson

For years Rome's Questura security cops found themselves choking on crooks' exhaust fumes in their put-putting Fiats.

From Time Magazine Archive

After a final, driving session with Il Duce in the chair, the put-putting motorboats carried ashore what was called a "pleasant surprise."

From Time Magazine Archive

Jean, who has ignored the instructions of the auto dealer, has just overturned his car, while Jacques, who paid attention, is pictured put-putting happily by on his motor bike.

From Time Magazine Archive

He stands at the back of his doodlebug, put-putting along at four to twelve miles an hour.

From Time Magazine Archive

You can hear the put-putting halfway across town.

From "Linked" by Gordon Korman