[f. TEST v.2 + -ING1.] The action of TEST v.2; putting to the test, trying, proving; in quot. 1687, subjecting to the Test Act.
1687. Good Advice, 61. The end of Testing and Persecuting.
1827. Coleridge, in Lit. Rem. (1839), IV. 317. A philosophy, which has for its object the trial and testing of the weights and measures themselves.
1839, 1842. [see TEST v.2 4].
1860. Merc. Marine Mag., VII. 141. The application of a severe strain in testing has an injurious effect on a cable.
b. attrib. and Comb. Pertaining to or used for testing, as testing-box, -machine, -office, station, etc.
1876. Preece & Sivewright, Telegraphy, 272. At certain stations along the line the wires are led into testing-boxes for the purpose of affording facilities for crossing, disconnecting, and putting them to earth…. The testing station is always the most important station on the circuit.
1877. Knight, Dict. Mech., 2538/2. In Fairbanks’s testing-machine, the crushing, breaking, or deflecting force is applied … by a cross-head.
1890. W. J. Gordon, Foundry, 111. In the same range as the roller shop is the laboratory, and further on is the testing office.
1905. Daily Chron., 22 April, 6/4. A six-cylinder racing car with a testing body passed at a speed that was not less than forty-five miles an hour.
