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Toehold vs Fulcrum - What's the difference?

toehold | fulcrum |

As nouns the difference between toehold and fulcrum

is that toehold is a foothold small enough to support just the toe while fulcrum is the support about which a lever pivots.

As a proper noun Fulcrum is

nATO code name for the Soviet MiG-29 aircraft.

toehold

English

Noun

(en noun)
  • (rock climbing) A foothold small enough to support just the toe.
  • (by extension) Any small advantage which allows one to make significant progress.
  • *1990 , (Peter Hopkirk), The Great Game , Folio Society 2010, p. 151:
  • *:Were Herat to fall to the Persians, this would give the Russians a crucial and dangerous toe-hold in western Afghanistan.
  • *2009 , Alan Travis, The Guardian , 8 Dec 2009:
  • *:One in three "adult-kids" who have not left the parental nest say they are still living at home because they cannot afford to get a toehold on the property ladder by buying or renting.

    • fulcrum

    English

    (wikipedia fulcrum)

    Noun

    (en-noun)
  • (mechanics) The support about which a lever pivots.
  • * It is possible to flick food across the table using your fork as a lever and your finger as a fulcrum .
  • * 2010 , , '' Bad Machinery
    • MILDRED: Archimedes said give me a lever long enough and a fulcrum on which to place it and I will move the world.
    CHARLOTTE: Yeah she said that twaddle eight or nine times.
  • *{{quote-magazine, date=2012-03
    • , author=(Henry Petroski) , title=Opening Doors , volume=100, issue=2, page=112-3 , magazine= citation , passage=A doorknob of whatever roundish shape is effectively a continuum of levers, with the axis of the latching mechanism—known as the spindle—being the fulcrum about which the turning takes place.}}