workstand

English

Etymology

work +‎ stand

Noun

workstand (plural workstands)

1. A worktable.
   • 1842 April, Mrs. A.M.F. Annan, “Mr. Chancy's Cooking Stove”, in The Ladies' Garland, volume 5, number 10, page 245:

     The workstand was completed—a complication of intricacies. There were drawers within drawers, and boxes within boxes; an appartment for each spool of cotton, with a lid to shut over it, and a lever to lift it out; all requiring as much time in opening and shutting, raising up, and pushing aside, as it would have taken to extricate the various implements and materials from a disordered work-bag.

   • 1887, Jeannette H. Walworth, Southern Silhouettes, page 46:

     Close up against one of the jambs, by the window that overlooks the dairy and the henyard and the vegetable garden, is ol ' Miss's workstand — a little square mahogany affair that is not independent of the support furnished it on two sides by the projection of the chimney and the wall by the window.

   • 1910, “Lindley v. State”, in The Southwestern Reporter, volume 123, page 1107:

     […] that he laid the money down on the workstand by the chair he was shaving the man in and went out; that he did not know whether appellant saw him lay the money down or not; that there were several persons in the shop at the time he laid the money on the workstand, that he tried to catch the appellant's eye, but did not think he did, nor did he know whether appellant got the money, or what became of it;

   • 1917, Harold Donaldson Eberlein, “The Well Appointed Guest Room”, in Henry W. Frohne, editor, Home Interiors, page 116:

     If you do supply the workstand, don't fail to put needles, cotton, buttons and darning requisites in one of the drawers. Without these the workstand is only a half-completed bit of thoughtfulness and had better be omitted altogether.

2. A device designed to lift and securely hold at a comfortable height something one is working on.
   • 1917, Morris A. Hall, George W. Cravens, Automobile Troubles and Repairs: Welding- Vulcanizing, page 70:

     A is essentially a workstand, intended to hold the axle and part of the propeller shaft while doing repair work thereon.

   • 1999, Vic Armijo, The Complete Idiot's Guide to Cycling, page 203:

     Most bike maintenance and adjustment jobs are much easier to do when the bike is placed in a bicycle workstand.

   • 2018, Robert P. Marini, Lynn M. Wachtman, Suzette D. Tardif, The Common Marmoset in Captivity and Biomedical Research, page 181:

     In this technique, the marmoset is placed in dorsal recumbency on the workstand and secured by its canine teeth and adjustable side bars. Once the animal is secured, the workstand is tilted to a 45-degrees position with the animal's head up.

3. A raised platform on which to stand while working, often with a hydraulic lift.
   • 1975, United States. Congress. House. Committee on Government Operations, Safety in the Federal Workplace, page 179:

     On November 21, 1974, a civilian employee at Kelly Air Force Base in Texas was fatally injured by a fall from a workstand while applying tape and masking paper to the fuselage of a huge C-5A cargo plane.

   • 1980, Approach, volume 25, number 8:

     A workstand was moved into position beneath the main door to help crewmembers climb out of the aircraft. The flight engineer climbed out of the aircraft to supervise the refueling, started down the workstand, but remembered he had forgotten his flashlight.

   • 1989, Thomas J. Albin, “Assessment of Accident Risk During Haulage Truck and Power Shovel Maintenance and Recommendations for Improved Safety”, in Robert H. Peters, editor, Review of Recent Research on Organizational and Behavioral Factors Associated With Mine Safety, page 5:

     Falls and some overexertion injuries are related to workstand characteristics. As previously mentioned, the absence of railings may increase the severity of an injury, and the frictional properties of the surface may increase the probability of an accident. Workers exerting force while assuming an awkward posture because of the height of the workstand are at increased risk of an overexertion injury.

   • 1990, Thomas J. Albin, Assessment of Accident Risk During Haulage Truck and Power Shovel Maintenance and Recommendations for Improved Safety, page 4:

     As a starting point, such a workstand could be similar to the "bucket" of a cherry picker, essentially a cylinder enclosing the worker.