Thesaurus.com
Dictionary.com
Showing results for catenary. Search instead for flechtenart.
Definitions

catenary

[kat-n-er-ee, kuh-tee-nuh-ree] / ˈkæt nˌɛr i, kəˈti nə ri /


Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

See Examples For:

Its form is that of the catenary curve, the most perfect shape for an arch, and the only one that requires no buttressing from the side.

From The Wall Street Journal Jun. 27, 2026

Without the structural principles behind catenary curves, there would be no Gothic cathedrals or Renaissance domes — nor, for that matter, any lacy spiderwebs.

From Los Angeles Times Mar. 17, 2025

“I see the stations, the empty parking spaces, the catenary wires that power the trains, and think surely we should put it to use,” Sound Transit board member Claudia Balducci, of Bellevue, said last week.

From Seattle Times Nov. 9, 2022

Replacement of track infrastructure, and the electric catenary poles and wires and the signal systems, is work that goes on every year.

From Washington Post Sep. 9, 2021

To eliminate any possibility of the trolley wire breaking, a strong steel cable, called a catenary, was slung just above the trolley wire.

From Tom Swift and His Electric Locomotive, or, Two Miles a Minute on the Rails by Victor [pseud.] Appleton

Power is often still carried on lines that hang in graceful catenaries of various depths from poles that lean left or right randomly but rarely stand straight.

From New York Times Nov. 16, 2012

A relief sculpture by Charles Biederman or the prodigious steel catenaries of Othmar H. Ammann's design for the George Washington Bridge?

From Time Magazine Archive

The catenaries which lie beyond the two generate surfaces whose radius of curvature convex towards the axis in the meridian plane is greater than the radius of concave curvature.

From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 5, Slice 3 "Capefigue" to "Carneades" by Various

Now let us consider the surfaces of revolution formed by this system of catenaries revolving about the directrix of the two catenaries of equal tension.

From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 5, Slice 3 "Capefigue" to "Carneades" by Various

It is true, they will not be exact catenaries, but they will depart very little from it; much less than portions of circles will.

From Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson, Volume 2 by Thomas Jefferson Randolph




Vocabulary lists containing catenary


Vocabulary.com logo
by dictionary.com

Dictionary.com's Learning Companion

Go beyond just looking up words.
Remember them forever with VocabTrainer.

Start training