lapping

Plurallappings

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle of lap.

   Floodwater kept lapping at the sandbags through the night.

   She loved the feeling of cool water lapping around her ankles.

   Note

   The -ing form of the verb does double duty. In she was lapping the cloth over the edge it is a participle, and in lapping takes patience it is a gerund naming the action. It can also stand before a noun as a describing word, as in lapping wavelets. Do not confuse it with the noun of the same spelling: only the noun takes a plural, lappings.

2. 2
   nouncountable or uncountable

   The gentle, rhythmic sound made by water splashing softly against a solid surface.

   The lapping of waves against the hull lulled the crew to sleep.

   From the cabin she could hear the steady lapping at the shoreline.

   Similarsplashing, wash

3. 3
   noununcountable

   The process of rubbing or polishing a metal surface to make it smooth.

   Lapping the gauge blocks produced surfaces flat to within a fraction of a micron.

   The machinist relied on lapping to achieve the precise flatness the part required.

   Similarpolishing, honing

4. 4
   noununcountable

   A form of fraud in which payments recorded in the accounts are repeatedly delayed between periods, or shifted between customers, to conceal a theft.

   The clerk concealed the missing funds through lapping, applying each new payment to the previous customer's balance.

   Investigators traced the lapping back through months of misposted receipts.

   Note

   An accountant's word for a cover-up that has to keep running. Money taken from one payment is hidden by posting the next receipt against it. That either pushes the gap into a later period or moves it onto another customer's account. Because each fix opens a new hole, the scheme must be repeated again and again. This is why lapping tends to come to light across months of misposted receipts rather than in a single entry.

5. 5
   noununcountable

   In textile making, the forming of fibrous material into a lap, or flat fleece, ready to be fed into a carding machine.

   Even lapping ensured the carding machine received a uniform web of fiber.

   Defects in the cotton often showed up during lapping, before the fibers reached the cards.

6. 6
   noununcountable

   Material that calico printers use as a blanket or wrapping on their printing machines.

   Printers fitted the cylinder with lapping to protect the fabric from the engraved roller.

   Worn lapping left faint marks across the printed calico.

   Note

   Samuel Frederick Gray describes it in The Chemistry of the Arts (1830). Twenty to thirty thicknesses of strong twilled woolen cloth were wound around the iron roller, and the machine printer called this the lapping. It cushioned both the calico and the copper printing roller. The name fits the job, since it is something lapped, or wrapped, around a cylinder. The noun goes back to Middle English lapping, from lap plus -ing.

7. 7
   noununcountable

   The process of rubbing away the lands (the metal ridges between the grooves of a rifled gun barrel) to enlarge the bore.

   Lapping the barrel removed minor imperfections left by the rifling process.

   Careful lapping enlarged the bore just enough to restore accuracy.

   Note

   Gunsmithing makes this a job done inside the barrel. The lands are the raised strips of metal left standing between the grooves of the rifling, and lapping wears them down so the bore opens up. It is the general polishing of metal put to one exacting purpose. The difference is the goal: here the rubbing removes metal to change a dimension, not simply to smooth a surface.

8. 8
   noununcountable

   Lengths of fine silk, metal wire, or whalebone wound tightly around the stick of a string instrument's bow, next to the leather grip at the heel.

   The bow maker replaced the silver lapping just above the heel.

   Delicate silk lapping protected the player's thumb where it met the stick.

   Similarwinding

   Note

   Bow makers also call it the winding. It is wound tight around the stick just above the leather grip at the heel, and its material is part of how a bow is described: silk, fine metal wire or whalebone lapping. Like the calico printer's blanket, the name comes from what the thing is, something lapped, or wrapped, around a cylinder.

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