Rack vs Rail - What's the difference?
rack | rail |
A series of one or more shelves, stacked one above the other
Any of various kinds of frame for holding clothes, bottles, animal fodder, mined ore, shot on a vessel, etc.
(nautical) A piece or frame of wood, having several sheaves, through which the running rigging passes; called also rack block.
A distaff.
A bar with teeth]] on its face or edge, to work with those of a gearwheel, [[pinion#Etymology 2, pinion, or worm, which is to drive or be driven by it.
A bar with teeth on its face or edge, to work with a pawl as a ratchet allowing movement in one direction only, used for example in a handbrake or crossbow.
A device, incorporating a ratchet, used to torture victims by stretching them beyond their natural limits.
* Macaulay
A cranequin, a mechanism including a rack, pinion and pawl, providing both mechanical advantage and a ratchet, used to bend and a crossbow.
A pair of antlers (as on deer, moose or elk).
A cut of meat involving several adjacent ribs.
(billiards, snooker, pool) A hollow triangle used for aligning the balls at the start of a game.
(slang) A woman's breasts.
(climbing, caving) A friction device for abseiling, consisting of a frame with 5 or more metal bars, around which the rope is threaded. Also rappel rack'', ''abseil rack .
(climbing, slang) A climber's set of equipment for setting up protection and belays, consisting of runners, slings, karabiners, nuts, Friends, etc.
A grate on which bacon is laid.
(obsolete) That which is extorted; exaction.
To place in or hang on a rack.
To torture (someone) on the rack.
* Alexander Pope
* 2011 , Thomas Penn, Winter King , Penguin 2012, p. 228:
To cause (someone) to suffer pain.
* Milton
(figurative) To stretch or strain; to harass, or oppress by extortion.
* Shakespeare
* Spenser
* Fuller
(billiards, snooker, pool) To put the balls into the triangular rack and set them in place on the table.
(slang) To strike a male in the groin with the knee.
To (manually) load (a round of ammunition) from the magazine or belt into firing position in an automatic or semiautomatic firearm.
(mining) To wash (metals, ore, etc.) on a rack.
(nautical) To bind together, as two ropes, with cross turns of yarn, marline, etc.
Thin, flying, broken clouds, or any portion of floating vapour in the sky.
* Francis Bacon
* Charles Kingsley
(brewing) To clarify, and thereby deter further fermentation of, beer, wine or cider by draining or siphoning it from the dregs.
* Francis Bacon
(of a horse) To amble fast, causing a rocking or swaying motion of the body; to pace.
A horizontal bar extending between supports and used for support or as a barrier; a railing.
* , chapter=7
, title= The metal bar that makes the track for a railroad.
* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-01, volume=407, issue=8838
, page=13 (Technology Quarterly), magazine=(The Economist)
, title= A railroad; a railway.
A horizontal piece of wood that serves to separate sections of a door or window.
(surfing) One of the lengthwise edges of a surfboard.
* Nick Carroll, surfline.com [http://www.surfline.com/community/whoknows/10_21_rails.cfm]:
To travel by railway.
* Rudyard Kipling
To enclose with rails or a railing.
* Ayliffe
To range in a line.
* Francis Bacon
To complain violently ((against), (about)).
* {{quote-news
, year=2012
, date=June 4
, author=Lewis Smith
, title=Queen's English Society says enuf is enough, innit?
, work=the Guardian
* 1994 , Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom , Abacus 2010, p. 27:
(obsolete) An item of clothing; a cloak or other garment; a dress.
(obsolete) Specifically, a woman's headscarf or neckerchief.
(label) To gush, flow (of liquid).
*, Bk.V, Ch.iv:
*:his breste and his brayle was bloodé – and hit rayled all over the see.
*1596 , (Edmund Spenser), (The Faerie Queene) , IV.2:
*:So furiously each other did assayle, / As if their soules they would attonce haue rent / Out of their brests, that streames of bloud did rayle / Adowne, as if their springes of life were spent.
In obsolete terms the difference between rack and rail
is that rack is a wreck; destruction while rail is to gush, flow (of liquid).As nouns the difference between rack and rail
is that rack is a series of one or more shelves, stacked one above the other while rail is a horizontal bar extending between supports and used for support or as a barrier; a railing.As verbs the difference between rack and rail
is that rack is to place in or hang on a rack while rail is to travel by railway.rack
English
(wikipedia rack)Etymology 1
See Dutch rekkenNoun
(en noun)- During the troubles of the fifteenth century, a rack was introduced into the Tower, and was occasionally used under the plea of political necessity.
- I bought a rack of lamb at the butcher's yesterday.
- See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rack_%28billiards%29]
- I used almost a full rack on the second pitch.
Derived terms
* autorack * bike rack * cheese rack/cheese-rack * gun rack * spice rack * roof rack * toast rackVerb
(en verb)- He was racked and miserably tormented.
- As the poet Sir Thomas Wyatt later recalled, his father, Henry VII's jewel-house keeper Henry Wyatt, had been racked on the orders of Richard III, who had sat there and watched.
- Vaunting aloud but racked with deep despair.
- Try what my credit can in Venice do; / That shall be racked even to the uttermost.
- The landlords there shamefully rack their tenants.
- They rack a Scripture simile beyond the true intent thereof.
Etymology 2
(etyl)Derived terms
* rack one's brainEtymology 3
Probably from (etyl)Noun
(-)- (Shakespeare)
- The winds in the upper region, which move the clouds above, which we call the rack , pass without noise.
- And the night rack came rolling up.
Etymology 4
(etyl) rakkenVerb
(en verb)- It is in common practice to draw wine or beer from the lees (which we call racking ), whereby it will clarify much the sooner.
Etymology 5
See , or rock (verb).Verb
(en verb)- (Fuller)
Etymology 6
See wreck.Derived terms
* rack and ruinReferences
Anagrams
*rail
English
Etymology 1
From (etyl) (m), (m), ; see regular.Noun
(en noun)Mr. Pratt's Patients, passage=Old Applegate, in the stern, just set and looked at me, and Lord James, amidship, waved both arms and kept hollering for help. I took a couple of everlasting big strokes and managed to grab hold of the skiff's rail , close to the stern.}}
Ideas coming down the track, passage=A “moving platform” scheme
- Rails alone can only ever have a marginal effect on a board's general turning ability.
Derived terms
* guardrail * handrail * live rail * railcard * railfanning * railhead * railway * ride the rails * split rail * third railVerb
(en verb)- Mottram of the Indian Survey had ridden thirty and railed one hundred miles from his lonely post in the desert
- It ought to be fenced in and railed .
- They were brought to London all railed in ropes, like a team of horses in a cart.
Etymology 2
(etyl) .Usage notes
Not all birds in the family Rallidae are rails by their common name. The family also includes coots]], moorhens, crakes, flufftails, [[waterhen, waterhens and others.Derived terms
* banded railSee also
* corncrakeEtymology 3
From (etyl) railler.Verb
(en verb)citation, page= , passage=The Queen may be celebrating her jubilee but the Queen's English Society, which has railed against the misuse and deterioration of the English language, is to fold.}}
- Chief Joyi railed against the white man, whom he believed had deliberately sundered the Xhosa tribe, dividing brother from brother.
Etymology 4
From (etyl) (m), (m), from (etyl) .Alternative forms
*Noun
(en noun)- (Fairholt)