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Knocking off

Posted by R A Collinge on November 01, 2008 at 19:37

Knocking off; re the first meaning- to stop work.
It has been suggested to me that this derives from the practice of knocking a drive belt from a driving pulley to a free running pulley thus ceasing work It could apply to any belt driven machinery. In this case it was in 19th century wood turning mill. Any comment?

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