workings

English

Noun

workings

1. plural of working.

Noun

workings pl (plural only)

1. The internal mechanism of some device or system.
   • 2013 June 22, “Engineers of a different kind”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8841, page 70:

     Private-equity nabobs bristle at being dubbed mere financiers. Piling debt onto companies’ balance-sheets is only a small part of what leveraged buy-outs are about, they insist. Improving the workings of the businesses they take over is just as core to their calling, if not more so. Much of their pleading is public-relations bluster.

2. The parts of a quarry or mine that are being (or has been) worked.
   • 2022 September 21, “Lifts at Selby by next summer”, in RAIL, number 966, page 21:

     The main platforms are unusually far apart, because the two centre tracks were lifted after the East Coast Main Line was diverted in 1983 to avoid now defunct new coal workings.

Derived terms

• inner workings