English

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Noun

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working order (uncountable)

  1. (especially of machinery) The state or condition of being operational or of functioning acceptably.
    • 1870–1871 (date written), Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], chapter XLV, in Roughing It, Hartford, Conn.: American Publishing Company [et al.], published 1872, →OCLC, page 315:
      [T]he Commission got itself into systematic working order, and for weeks the contributions flowed into its treasury in a generous stream.
    • 1908, H. G. Wells, chapter 10, in The War in the Air:
      The engine was in working order.
    • 1944 January and February, “Light Railways in Derbyshire”, in Railway Magazine, page 25:
      The locomotive stock consists of three of the six original American-built 4-6-0 tanks, named Bridget, Peggy, and Hummy, all in clean condition and good working order; [...].
    • 1961 January, “The latest in Continental electric multiple-units and their operation”, in Trains Illustrated, page 47:
      Each coach on the Swedish Yoa2 is 57ft long and 10ft 4in wide; with its two traction motors the unit weighs 79 tons in working order and has a maximum speed of under 60 m.p.h.
    • 1980, AA Book of British Villages, Drive Publications Ltd, page 98:
      Upstream from the house is a watermill, cased in gleaming white weather-boarding, which has been restored to working order. Near by is the water-driven turbine which [Rudyard] Kipling had installed in 1902 to light his mansion with electricity.
    • 2003 September 22, Unmesh Kher, “3 Flawed Assumptions About Postwar Iraq”, in Time:
      The Pentagon's plans assumed that Iraq's industrial base and utilities were in working order.

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  NODES
Note 1