▪ I. flapping, vbl. n.
(ˈflæpɪŋ)
[f. flap v. + -ing1.]
† 1. The action of knocking or beating; also attrib. Obs.
| 1629 Gaule Pract. Th. 335 He's made their flapping, flouting, spawling Sport. a 1693 Urquhart Rabelais iii. xl. 331 The banging and flapping of him. |
2. The action of moving (wings) up and down.
| 1398 Trevisa Barth. De P.R. xii. xiii. (1495) 422 By contynual flappynge of wynges the gnatte makyth noyse in the ayre. 1824 Lamb Elia Ser. ii. Blakesmoor in H―shire, The hum and flappings of that one solitary wasp. 1843 Lever J. Hinton xxxiv, The heavy flapping of strong wing would point the course of a heron. |
3. a. The action of swaying or working to and fro something broad and loose.
| 1631 J. Taylor (Water P.) Turn. Fort. Wheel (1848) 13 They hold your blessinge in no more avayle Then is the flapping of a fox his taile! 1841–71 T. R. Jones Anim. Kingd. (ed. 4) 603 By vigorous flappings of this extensive organ, the animal [the poulpe] actively impels itself through the water in a backward direction. |
b. Aeronaut. The angular up-and-down oscillation of the blade of a helicopter about its hinge. Also attrib.
| 1937 Jrnl. R. Aeronaut. Soc. XLI. 820 Although the airscrew may be at an angle, I will call the first flapping ‘vertical flapping’ and the second ‘horizontal flapping’. 1940 H. E. Baughman Aviation Dict. 80/1 Flapping angle, the difference between the coning angle and the instantaneous angle of the span axis of a blade of a rotary wing system. 1949 Aircraft Engin. Feb. 33/1 Don Juan de la Cierva, father of rotating wing aircraft, introduced a very ingenious but simple invention, the flapping blade. 1950 Gloss. Aeronaut. Terms (B.S.I.) I. 44 Flapping angle, the angle between the tip-path plane and the plane normal to the hub axis. Ibid. 45 Flapping hinge, a pivot which allows the zenithal angle of the blade to be varied with respect to the rotor head. 1955 Liptrot & Woods Rotorcraft v. 43 In forward flight the advancing blade moves upwards about the hinge..the retreating side moves downward... It is this motion about the mean coning position, due to this dissymmetry of lift, which is known as ‘flapping’. |
4. Racing slang. A form of racing which is not subject to Jockey Club or National Hunt Committee regulations, or, in greyhound racing, to those of the National Greyhound Racing Club.
| 1911 Queen 8 Apr. 581/1 In racing parlance there are three sorts of racing, ‘the flat’, ‘over the sticks’, and ‘flapping’. The first is the spring, summer, and autumn sport, the second is the winter sport of steeplechasing, and the third either form of racing which takes place neither under Jockey Club nor National Hunt regulations. 1916 Daily Express 9 Sept. 3/5 There was trouble at the ‘flapping’ meeting at Blaydon..on Saturday. 1928 Daily Tel. 14 Feb. 11/5 ‘Flapping Meetings’..will not be exempted by the bill from the provisions of the Betting Act, 1853. 1947 F. Tomlinson in Police Jrnl. July–Sept. (title) The ‘Flapping Track’ [of a greyhound-racing stadium]. 1955 Daily Tel. 27 Apr. 7/3 The Inspr. said: ‘By injecting them [sc. greyhounds] with this stuff?’ and Selby said ‘Yes.’ Asked if he realised it was illegal, Selby replied: ‘Never. I only do it at flapping tracks.’ 1969 C. Drummond Odds on Death vi. 136 The old ‘flapping’ meetings. |
▪ II. ˈflapping, ppl. a.
[+ -ing2.]
That flaps. Applied spec. to the upward and downward movement of the wings of birds and, formerly, of flying machines. So flapping flight, etc.
| 1592 W. Wyrley Armorie 144 The flapping brace strikes off his setled hood. 1706 Lond. Gaz. No. 4236/4 A dark brown Mare..with flapping Ears. 1711 Gay Trivia i. 128 Beneath his flapping Hat secures his Hair. a 1857 G. Cayley Let. in C. H. Gibbs-Smith Cayley's Aeronaut. (1962) xlii. 135 You must mind, when you couple the flapping wings to the handle that works them, that the connecting rod takes [?] into the butt end of the wing rod at such a distance from the hinge of the wing as to allow the hand of the person working [it] to go through two feet, whilst the tip end of the wing just completes its full range. 1859 Geo. Eliot A. Bede 414 Totty trotted off in her flapping bonnet. 1864 M. E. Braddon H. Dunbar I. xvi. 285 She took the great flapping ears of the animal in her two hands. 1899 Aeronaut. Jrnl. July 59/1 (title) On Flapping Flight of Aeroplanes. Ibid., The older mathematical investigation by Navier of the problem of flapping flight, seems to be quite discredited. 1906 Sci. Amer. 18 Aug. 117 (caption) The Florencie Orthopter, or Flapping-Wing Machine. 1909 Flight 20 Feb. 99/2 The question is..what fundamental qualities of a flapping-flight machine assimilates its wings to those of the bird. 1921 Ibid. 15 Sept. 621/2 (title) Problem of Flapping Flight. 1954 Bannerman Birds Brit. Isles III. 133 The feathers are raised, the tail widely spread and raised and lowered at various angles..and the flapping flight indulged in. |