Forebeam
noun ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 The breast beam of a loom.
"They are sustained at bottom with other strong pieces of wood in the manner of trestles; and, to keep them the firmer, they are likewise fastened to the floor with a kind of buttresses, which prevent any shaking, though there are sometimes four or five workmen leaning on the forebeam at once."
- 2 A horizontal spar across the bow of some sailing vessels, used to stabilize the hulls of a catamaran, to secure a bowsprit, or to tie down the tack when there is no bowsprit.
"And herein also her forebeam to which her bowsprit was fastened, cracked clean insunder; and some of her timbers likeways in the hold we found defective."
- 3 The support section of a robot arm that goes from the main body of the robot to the gripper.
"The joints in the kinematic chain of a robot between the forebeam and end-effector are referred to as the wrist."
- 4 The leading portion of a remote signal from a moving source.
"The upwind forebeam data, for F9L1R19 (flight 9, line 1 and run 19), F2L1R1 and F3L1R1, the corresponding surface wind velocities are 6 knots, 22.5 knots, and 33 knots respectively, were processed."
Example
More examples"They are sustained at bottom with other strong pieces of wood in the manner of trestles; and, to keep them the firmer, they are likewise fastened to the floor with a kind of buttresses, which prevent any shaking, though there are sometimes four or five workmen leaning on the forebeam at once."
Etymology
From fore- + beam.
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.