Pack′ing.
1. A contrivance or a material to close a joint. See piston; piston-packing. In the atmospheric engines of Papin, Savary, and Newcomen, the piston was packed air-tight by means of flooding its upper surface with water. Watt obtained a patent for packing pistons with lubricators instead of water, 1769. The piston-rod is also packed in its stuffing-box. Various greasy materials with gaskets, oakum, etc., are used in joints which are screwed down; also collars of rubber, red-lead, luting. Flues and tubes are closed into the flue-sheets or tube-sheets by riveting. Tubes of condensers by thimbles, screw-joints, or preferably by Horatio Allen's collars of pine, which swell and close the joint but allow expansion and contraction.2. (Masonry.) The filling in of a hollow or double wall. 3. Air-tight joints for fruit or jam can-covers are made by screwing or clamping the covers upon a gasket of rubber; or wax or resin is run into a crevice. See fruit-jar. 4. Well-tubes are packed by rubber thimbles, inflatable bags filled with air or water, or with flaxseed, which swells as it absorbs water.
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