workings

Etymology

noun

1. plural of working.

noun

1. The internal mechanism of some device or system.
   Private-equity nabobs bristle at being dubbed mere financiers. Piling debt onto companies’ balance-sheets is only a small part of what leveraged buy-outs are about, they insist. Improving the workings of the businesses they take over is just as core to their calling, if not more so. Much of their pleading is public-relations bluster. 2013-06-22, “Engineers of a different kind”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8841, page 70
2. The parts of a quarry or mine that are being (or has been) worked.
   The main platforms are unusually far apart, because the two centre tracks were lifted after the East Coast Main Line was diverted in 1983 to avoid now defunct new coal workings. September 21 2022, “Lifts at Selby by next summer”, in RAIL, number 966, page 21