Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun One that excavates, especially a machine used for digging having a bucket attached to a two-part boom and a rotating cab for the operator.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun One who or that which excavates.
  • noun Specifically— A horse- or steam-power machine for digging, moving, or transporting loose gravel, sand, or soil. The ditch-excavator is practically a scoop-plow that loosens the sod, while an endless band armed with buckets scoops the soil, raises it, and throws it out at one side of the machine. The transporting excavator loosens the soil and raises it upon a traveling apron to a hopper. When the hopper is full the machine is dragged away upon a carrying-line to the place where the load is to be discharged.
  • noun An instrument used by dentists in removing carious parts of a tooth preparatory to filling it.
  • noun A modified form of dredging-machine used in digging irrigation canals. It consists of a chain-and-bucket conveyer mounted on a trolley that moves on rails laid on a traveling crane. Tracks are laid on each side of the canal, and upon these the crane moves. The conveyer, supported by a derrick, cuts into the soil, both below and above the water, and lifts it to chutes that discharge it on the banks at each side. Since the conveyer travels on the crane transversely to the length of the canal all the soil can be excavated and the crane advanced on the tracks as fast as the canal is dredged out.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun One who, or that which, excavates or hollows out; a machine, as a dredging machine, or a tool, for excavating.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A person who excavates
  • noun A curette used to scrape out pathological material
  • noun A vehicle, often on tracks, used to dig ditches etc; a backhoe; digger

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a machine for excavating
  • noun a workman who excavates for foundations of buildings or for quarrying

Etymologies

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Examples

  • To suggest decades of crime history with links to the construction industry without departing from the innocent child’s first person POV, the excavator is described as, “a middle-aged, lard-legged, low-IQ killer.”

    Writer Unboxed » Blog Archive » Interview: Lucia Nevai, Part 1 2008

  • Anya made a mental note to call an excavator to get the rest out of here.

    Sparks Laura Bickle 2010

  • Anya made a mental note to call an excavator to get the rest out of here.

    Sparks Laura Bickle 2010

  • Anya made a mental note to call an excavator to get the rest out of here.

    Sparks Laura Bickle 2010

  • The excavator was the last item being sold that day.

    Managing Strategic Relationships Leonard Greenhalgh 2001

  • The excavator was the last item being sold that day.

    Managing Strategic Relationships Leonard Greenhalgh 2001

  • The excavator was the last item being sold that day.

    Managing Strategic Relationships Leonard Greenhalgh 2001

  • Some of the larger items the city received in addition to the excavator were a D-7 Caterpillar dozer, valued at $144,650 and a Tymco regenerative air street sweeper, valued at $70,183.

    Sand Mountain Reporter: News 2010

  • Some of the larger items the city received in addition to the excavator were a D-7 Caterpillar dozer, valued at $144,650 and a Tymco regenerative air street sweeper, valued at $70,183.

    Sand Mountain Reporter: News 2010

  • We're talking about the Radio Controlled excavator, which is basically an electric replica of an actual excavator rolled out in Italy by Despe.

    Coolest Gadgets Edwin 2010

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