flywheel

English

Etymology

From fly +‎ wheel.

Pronunciation

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Noun

flywheel (plural flywheels)

  1. (mechanical engineering) A rotating mass used to maintain the speed of a machine within certain limits while the machine receives or releases energy at a varying rate, or as a form of energy storage.
    • 1955 January, Charles E. Lee, “The Glasgow Underground Railway”, in Railway Magazine, page 24:
      They were fitted with flywheels 25 ft. in dia. and weighing 50 tons each. The energy stored in such flywheels is very great, and in this case was of the order of 7,000,000 lb./ft. each.
    • 1959 March, “The 2,500 h.p. electric locomotives for the Kent Coast electrification”, in Trains Illustrated, page 123:
      As on Nos. 20001-3, the motor and generator armature shafts of the new locomotive each carry a heavy flywheel to provide kinetic energy and help maintain the speed of the motor-generator set during interruptions of supply, as at breaks in the continuity of the conductor rail.

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