shear Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. noun (physics) a deformation of an object in which parallel planes remain parallel but are shifted in a direction parallel to themselves
    • the shear changed the quadrilateral into a parallelogram
  2. noun a large edge tool that cuts sheet metal by passing a blade through it
  3. verb cut with shears
    • shear hedges
  4. verb shear the wool from
    fleece.
    • shear sheep
  5. verb cut or cut through with shears
    • shear the wool off the lamb
  6. verb become deformed by forces tending to produce a shearing strain

WordNet

Shear transitive verb
Etymology
OE. sheren, scheren, to shear, cut, shave, AS. sceran, scieran, scyran; akin to D. & G. scheren, Icel. skera, Dan. skire, Gr. . Cf. Jeer, Score, Shard, Share, Sheer to turn aside.
Wordforms
imperfect Sheared or Shore ;past participle Sheared or Shorn ; present participle & verbal noun Shearing
Definitions
  1. To cut, clip, or sever anything from with shears or a like instrument; as, to shear sheep; to shear cloth. ✍ It is especially applied to the cutting of wool from sheep or their skins, and the nap from cloth.
  2. To separate or sever with shears or a similar instrument; to cut off; to clip (something) from a surface; as, to shear a fleece.
    Before the golden tresses . . . were shorn away. Shak.
  3. To reap, as grain. Scot. Jamieson.
  4. Fig.: To deprive of property; to fleece.
  5. (Mech.) To produce a change of shape in by a shear. See Shear, n., 4.
Shear noun
Etymology
AS. sceara. See Shear, v. t.
Definitions
  1. A pair of shears; -- now always used in the plural, but formerly also in the singular. See Shears.
    On his head came razor none, nor shear. Chaucer.
    Short of the wool, and naked from the shear. Dryden.
  2. A shearing; -- used in designating the age of sheep.
    After the second shearing, he is a two-sher ram; . . . at the expiration of another year, he is a three-shear ram; the name always taking its date from the time of shearing. Youatt.
  3. (Engin.) An action, resulting from applied forces, which tends to cause two contiguous parts of a body to slide relatively to each other in a direction parallel to their plane of contact; -- also called shearing stress, and tangential stress.
  4. (Mech.) A strain, or change of shape, of an elastic body, consisting of an extension in one direction, an equal compression in a perpendicular direction, with an unchanged magnitude in the third direction.
Shear intransitive verb
Definitions
  1. To deviate. See Sheer.
  2. (Engin.) To become more or less completely divided, as a body under the action of forces, by the sliding of two contiguous parts relatively to each other in a direction parallel to their plane of contact.

Webster 1913