Discussions about eggcorns and related topics
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Chris -- 2018-04-11
All my life I’ve wondered just what “rack and pinion steering†was, but it took Peter’s pillion>>pinion post to get me to look it up. “Pinions†are small cogs or spurred wheels; “racks†in this case are toothed bars (surprisingly, the OED doesn’t think they’re etymologically related to ratchets). Well, okay. But I’ve got plenty of company in my ignorance. Lotsa people – including lots and LOTS of people on automotive forums – don’t have a clue what the standard term is either. Last year, Ken posted “rack opinion steering.†But the idea of personal impression can also be reflected in the first element rather than the last one:
The salesperson told me that this model has something called ABS brakes; reckon pinion steering, a 4 liter engine and independent suspension.
http://www.ebnerseminars.com/linksdigital.html
[The writer is transcribing his wife’s speech, but it’s not clear from context that the substitution is hers rather than his.]
Another surprisingly popular variant is “rack and peanut steering.†Lotsa hits for this; a Simpsons episode may have made it popular, but I don’t think that can account for all the instances out there:
I looked at building a V6 powered 105 a while ago, and from looking at the rhd engine bay and the pics of the LHD v6 conversion cars, you have to relocate the starter, or go to a rack and peanut steering.
http://www.alfabb.com/bb/forums/898883-post36.html
As a result, there are very few Cortina’s over here getting around with rack and peanut steering.
http://www.cortina-mk1classifieds.com/f … -1060.html
Even more delicious than the rack and peanut variants are the ones with pine nuts. I love toasted pine nuts. Every time I try to make pesto it turns out a bit flat because I’ve eaten half the nuts before putting them in the blender. I don’t drive, but if I do ever buy a car, I’ll definitely be looking for rack and pignon steering:
The rack and pignon steering is too scaled down, and this shows when driving slowly, it ’ s mushy when changing direction.
http://carworldonline.info/category/auto/ford/page/3
And some people would prefer Spanish-speaking pine nuts:
I was under the impression that rack and pinon steering was more precise and usually preferred on most sports cars.
And maybe the steering system just makes some cars louder than others:
I was told that nobody makes a lift for a 2000 4×4 Dakota Sport because of the racket-pinion steering on them. Is this true?
http://www.dodgedakotas.com/boards/raise/589.html
Pinions are part of cars; pistons are part of cars. Why not just substitute one for the other?:
This formula contains specially formulated anti-wear and anti-oxidants to prolong the life of your conventional or rack-and-piston steering system.
http://www.mightyautoparts.com/products … ering.html
The only “rack and pigeon†entries were jokes. And I was heartbroken that there was no “rack and penguin steering†out there anywhere – but I came close. Just a few of the spelling variants of “pinion,†to wet your appetite: penion, pinuin, piniiin, piniion, poinion, penut, piniot, pinoion, and – presumably the Greek entry – pnion.
After I had searched for about 40 variations, Google had had enough. I got a very annoyed-sounding message:
“We’re sorry, but your computer may be sending automated queries. To protect our users, we can’t process your request right now.â€
And though I’ve tried to be very, very good for the last 15 minutes, Big Brother Google still has his eye on me. I suspect that there’s got to be some version of “rocket pinion steering†out there somewhere, but putting in anything approaching that just gets me that very stern admonition.
Last edited by patschwieterman (2010-08-19 01:25:28)
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Of the collection of candidates, I think “rack and piston” is the most eggcornish. It might be a DNA eggcorn, a careless substitution of category-linked words for each other.
Do we, by the way, have a word for a collection of eggcorns? We should. Even geese have their gaggles.
Hatching new language, one eggcorn at a time.
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A ‘lode’
A ‘horde’
A ‘catch”
Last edited by JuanTwoThree (2010-08-19 10:21:42)
On the plain in Spain where it mainly rains.
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I like rack n peanut, or the gourmet rack and pignon.
Auto forum
they call me back and said the steering rack and pinning needs to be completly replace
Multiple transplant
My father’s pump just got replaced along with a rocking pinion and a jerking steering wheel
The googlethwart has stymied me several times. Irritating. I wrote to them about it – no reply. Disturbingly, all of the search engines are becoming homogenized and indistinguishable, and enfeebled. Google doesn’t allow or searches of this sort: “eat his|her|their feel”, nor does it do wild cards like “rack*” or “pis%on” or “p?ston”. AltaVista used to do some of these but it’s been enackerated too.
A flight
A cob
A clutch – appropriate for this post
Last edited by David Bird (2010-08-19 10:38:44)
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David B wrote:
Google doesn’t allow or searches of this sort: “eat his|her|their feelâ€, nor does it do wild cards like “rack*†or “pis%on†or “p?stonâ€. AltaVista used to do some of these but it’s been enackerated too.
I was thinking about Alta Vista just yesterday—before my pinion spasms—wondering whether it still allowed options Google doesn’t. Bummed to hear there’s no way out there, either. The Google thing is frustrating. They don’t allow those “or” searches or internal substitution searches, so we have to do MORE searches by hand with variants—which leads to them to block us because we look like envirused computers or automated systems. And I type so slowly—I can’t imagine that speedwise my behavior looks much like that of a machine. If you’re confusing me with an automated query program, you’ve probably got a pretty darn weak set of protocols.
The handy “enackerated” seems to be a Google-nonce—congrats!
Kem wrote:
Do we, by the way, have a word for a collection of eggcorns?
I’m not really big on neologizing, but I have also felt the lack of a collective noun that would denote a group of substitutions derived from the same acorn. (“Acorn” is one of our definite successes in the neologism game—I’ve been credited with its creation, but I’m pretty sure I borrowed it from someone else on the forum.) Hasn’t Kem or someone used “fuzzy cloud” for this kind of thing? Juan’s suggestion of “catch” has a charmingly subtle suggestion of eggcornicity, but I’m not sure any single-word term will be able to nail the concept.
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A klatch? (= clutch?) I’m not that good at neologizing either. But I agree that a useful term or terms would be a good thing.
What different aspects hold one of these fuzzy things together? Being derived from the same acorn is only one of them.
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
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Hold on, a bit of checking showed that I was once more talking through my head. The following will work:
Google “throw OR throwing your OR my * into the ring”
AltaVista “threw his|her|its|their * into the ring”
AltaVista also supports AND, OR, ANDNOT, and NEAR if you put them in capitals. The asterisk works as a wild card for a word or words, but not within words. I wonder whether the within-word search, which would be so useful for eggcorn sleuthing, would also be lethal for email address searching, for example, and maybe that’s why it’s been disabled everywhere.
Last edited by David Bird (2010-08-19 14:50:05)
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A carton of eggcorns?
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For the offspring of a single acorn what about simblings, which has scrambled bits of semblance, similar and sibling, and reference can then be made to a single simbling where required.
‘Scrimbling’, sounds too verblike, and I’m having to resist teasing out the possible meaning. There’s always scrample, which combines ‘sample’ (‘a small part of something intended as representative of the whole’) with a little eggish scrambling.
Last edited by Peter Forster (2010-08-20 06:01:48)
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Honesty in advertising
TOYOTA RAIDER : 2006, wreck and pinion power steering
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