breast beam

American

noun

a horizontal bar, located at the front of a loom, over which the woven material is passed on its way to the cloth roll.
Architecture. breastsummer.

Etymology

Origin of breast beam

First recorded in 1780–90

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

All the drawings but Wilkinson’s show the warp threads converging towards the breast beam; Wilkinson shows them parallel and in Lepsius their convergence is excessive.

From Project Gutenberg

Just above the breast beam there are 8 or 9 threads of weft but they are too faint to be included.

From Project Gutenberg

The breast beam:—It appears to me that the three portions marked G1, G2 and G3 joined up are intended to represent the breast beam and its holding pegs, similar to the warp beam A and its pegs B1, B2, but the portion K is not clearly drawn in any of the reproductions.

From Project Gutenberg

In Cailliaud the warp threads are coloured in pale blue and red on top of the black lines of the drawing; he has painted the selvedge and finished cloth a pale blue, as well as that portion of G2 which is covered by the cloth indicating that this is the breast beam, G3 and G1 are painted a dark red.

From Project Gutenberg

The threads of the warp and the finished piece of cloth at the breast beam end are clearly indicated.

From Project Gutenberg

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023