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Wrench   /rɛntʃ/   Listen
noun
Wrench  n.  
1.
Trick; deceit; fraud; stratagem. (Obs.) "His wily wrenches thou ne mayst not flee."
2.
A violent twist, or a pull with twisting. "He wringeth them such a wrench." "The injurious effect upon biographic literature of all such wrenches to the truth, is diffused everywhere."
3.
A sprain; an injury by twisting, as in a joint.
4.
Means; contrivance. (Obs.)
5.
An instrument, often a simple bar or lever with jaws or an angular orifice either at the end or between the ends, for exerting a twisting strain, as in turning bolts, nuts, screw taps, etc.; a screw key. Many wrenches have adjustable jaws for grasping nuts, etc., of different sizes.
6.
(Mech.) The system made up of a force and a couple of forces in a plane perpendicular to that force. Any number of forces acting at any points upon a rigid body may be compounded so as to be equivalent to a wrench.
Carriage wrench, a wrench adapted for removing or tightening the nuts that confine the wheels on the axles, or for turning the other nuts or bolts of a carriage or wagon.
Monkey wrench. See under Monkey.
Wrench hammer, a wrench with the end shaped so as to admit of being used as a hammer.


verb
Wrench  v. t.  (past & past part. wrenched; pres. part. wrenching)  
1.
To pull with a twist; to wrest, twist, or force by violence. "Wrench his sword from him." "Forthwith this frame of mine was wrenched With a woeful agony."
2.
To strain; to sprain; hence, to distort; to pervert. "You wrenched your foot against a stone."





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Wrench" Quotes from Famous Books



... on the Royal Bench Of Brittish Themis, with no mean applause Pronounc't and in his volumes taught our Lawes, Which others at their Barr so often wrench: To day deep thoughts resolve with me to drench In mirth, that after no repenting drawes; Let Euclid rest and Archimedes pause, And what the Swede intend, and what the French. To measure life, learn thou betimes, and know Toward solid good ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... opposite the tail center and made secure. The drill, which is flat, is drilled to receive the tail center, and it is kept from turning by the holder, and is kept from lateral movement and chattering by a wrench, C, which is turned so as to bind the drill in the slot of ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 312, December 24, 1881 • Various
... with conflicting thoughts, and for a moment even my faith seemed at a low ebb. I could hear my children's stifled sobs, and my darling wife shed silent tears. The thought of parting from them gave me the bitterest wrench. With my fleeting breath I gasped these words, 'That mercy I showed others, that show thou me.' The darkened room grew darker, and after that I died. In my sleep I seemed to dream. All about were ...
— A Journey in Other Worlds - A Romance of the Future • John Jacob Astor
... this character is entirely modern. "Les Miserables" is a story of the city and of poverty, and can not be dissociated from them by any wrench of thought, however violent. Not that urban life or poverty are new elements in the school of suffering. They are not new, as pain is not new. This is the difference. In the old ages, the city and poverty ...
— A Hero and Some Other Folks • William A. Quayle
... it," said Kenneth, quietly, as she gave it a twist and a wrench. And he put out his hand, and took it from hers, and drew gently upward in the line in which she had ...
— Real Folks • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney


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