washboard

English

Etymology

From wash +‎ board.

Noun

washboard (plural washboards)

1. A board with a corrugated surface against which laundry may be rubbed.
2. (music) Such a board used as a simple percussion instrument.
3. (nautical) A board fastened along a ship's gunwale to prevent splashing; a splashboard.
4. A stretch of ripples or bumps on a dirt or gravel road caused by interaction between traffic and road surface.
   • 2009, Chinle Miller, Desert Rats: Adventures in the American Outback, page 35:

     Franklin is beside himself, revving up the engine in the pickup. As I jump in, he spins out and takes off up the road in the direction the plane came from, bouncing dangerously over washboards and ruts.

5. (dated) baseboard; skirting board

Derived terms

• coconut washboard
• washboard ab
• washboard abdomen
• washboardist

Translations

board to do laundry

• Aleut: duskax̂
• Basque: latsazur
• Bulgarian: дъска за пране (dǎska za prane)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 洗衣板 (zh) (xǐyībǎn)

• Czech: valcha (cs) f
• Danish: vaskebræt n
• Dutch: wasbord (nl) n
• Esperanto: lavtabulo
• Finnish: pyykkilauta (fi)
• French: planche à laver (fr) f
• Galician: lavadoiro (gl) m
• German: Waschbrett (de) n
• Hebrew: קרש כביסה
• Hungarian: please add this translation if you can
• Italian: asse per lavare m, asse per il bucato m
• Japanese: 洗濯板 (ja)
• Korean: 빨래판 (ppallaepan)
• Macedonian: перална даска f (peralna daska)
• Maranao: batalan
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: vaskebrett n

  Nynorsk: vaskebrett n

• Plautdietsch: Riew f
• Polish: tara (pl) f
• Portuguese: tanquinho (pt)
• Russian: стира́льная доска́ (ru) f (stirálʹnaja doská)
• Spanish: lavadero (es) m
• Swedish: tvättbräda (sv) c
• Turkish: çamaşır tahtası
• Ukrainian: пральна дошка f (pralʹna doška)

a board on the gunwale of a boat to stop splashing - a splash board

• Dutch: zetbord n
• Finnish: roiskesuoja, räve
• Maori: pāiri, rauawa, parengaru, paretai

percussion instrument

• Finnish: pyykkilauta (fi)
• French: planche à laver (fr) f
• German: Waschbrett (de) n
• Russian: стира́льная доска́ (ru) f (stirálʹnaja doská)
• Swedish: tvättbräda (sv) c

Verb

washboard (third-person singular simple present washboards, present participle washboarding, simple past and past participle washboarded)

1. To produce a rippled texture on a surface.
   • 1967, James Jones, Go to the Widow-Maker, page 515:

     Doug came up with a half-guilty smile and washboarded his forehead at her.

   • 1992, Ocean Realm, page 17:

     The rip that was generated by each change of tide had scoured the bottom white and washboarded the sand where it was still layered over the hardpan coral floor.

   • 1997, David Poyer, The Passage: A Thriller, →ISBN:

     The low bass brruummmp of 20-mm slugs going out washboarded the bulkheads.

   • 2001, Phoebe:

     She drove as fast as she dared, braking for the frost heaves that washboarded the blacktop and on her dirt road, bouncing in and out of the clay ruts cut by the flow of runoff.

2. To play a washboard.
   • 2008, The New Yorker, page 28:

     It's almost as if the urge to washboard is intrinsically human.

3. (bees) To move up and down or back and forth across the surface of a hive, possibly to lay down a layer of propolis and wax.
   • 2015, James E. Tew, The Beekeeper's Problem Solver, →ISBN, page 73:

     Individual bees have been observed washboarding on the inside glass of an observation hive.

   • 2015, Robert Owen, The Australian Beekeeping Manual, →ISBN, page 19-51:

     This behaviour is believed to be associated with general cleaning activities but under what circumstances workers washboard is not known.