On Friday, July 15, 2011 09:43:31 AM Anne Wilson did opine: > On Friday 15 Jul 2011 00:37:58 Alex Schuster wrote: > > dict.leo.org suggests [screw] wrench or spanner. Or 'monkey wrench' > > for 'englischer Schraubenschl�ssel'. Ah, 'der Engl�nder'! An > > adjustable wrench. Oh, and there even is 'crescent wrench' for 'Swiss > > spanner'. > > I love these essays into language comparisons :-) Although all English > recognise the word "wrench", "spanner" is the more commonly used here. > OTOH, "monkey wrench" I associate with heavy-duty contexts, such as > motor- engineering. Then there's that thing that I know of as an > "adjustable spanner" - apparently the English spanner to you LOL > > Anne
Chuckle. That adjustable spanner, is a "Crescent Wrench" here in the US, because the Crescent people owned the long since expired patent, and it has been the generic term for such a tool for at least 70 years that I know of. Similarly, the "monkey wrench" we use here, represents a wrench/spanner that was also adjustable by a similar means, but the forces against the adjuster were essentially direct, where the 'Crescent' version used jaw motion wedging friction to aid the adjuster in holding position much better. The end result is that I can buy generic crescent wrenches almost anyplace, but a genuine monkey wrench will likely be sold at an estate auction as its likely both in excess of 100 years old, and worth 25x what it cost new just as an antique. They are also commonly called knuckle busters on this side of the pond, because they were very good at it. Trivia, never played the game myself. ;-) Cheers, gene -- "There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order." -Ed Howdershelt (Author) Promise her anything, but give her Exxon unleaded. ___________________________________________________ This message is from the kde mailing list. Account management: https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/kde. Archives: http://lists.kde.org/. More info: http://www.kde.org/faq.html.
