Backfiring
noun, verb ·4 syllables ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 The occurrence of a backfire. countable, uncountable
"Backfiring in mercury arc rectifiers has now been pinpointed as the primary cause of the Glasgow transformer failures. […] The chief causes of rectifier backfiring in the Glasgow units were overheating or unfavourable anode/cathode temperature differential; it has proved possible to overcome these, although occasional backfires do still occur."
- 2 A failure that leads to further misfortune. countable, figuratively, uncountable
- 1 present participle and gerund of backfire form-of, gerund, participle, present
Example
More examples"Backfiring in mercury arc rectifiers has now been pinpointed as the primary cause of the Glasgow transformer failures. […] The chief causes of rectifier backfiring in the Glasgow units were overheating or unfavourable anode/cathode temperature differential; it has proved possible to overcome these, although occasional backfires do still occur."
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.