Skip to main content
Glite Dictionary
driving wheel

driving wheel

3.7
A wheel on a vehicle that gets power from the engine and moves the vehicle
  • noun
  • /ˈdraɪvɪŋ wiːl/
  • Specialized
translation icon : volante
  • When I pressed the gas pedal, the driving wheel transmitted power from the engine to the ground.

Examples

  • Get behind the driving wheel

    College (2008)

  • There would be no difficulty for anybody who had enough intelligence to know the difference between the wheels and the driving wheel of a car.

    Blog text (10)

  • The car's driving wheel allowed me to steer smoothly around the corner.

  • To make a right turn, you must gently turn the driving wheel to the right.

Surface Forms

driving wheel singular
driving wheels plural

Morphology

driving + wheel

The phrase is compositionally built from 'driving' (related to operating a vehicle) + 'wheel', so learners will likely infer it denotes a wheel involved in driving. However, the precise technical sense — a wheel that receives engine power (as opposed to the steering wheel) — is specialized and could be unclear without mechanical knowledge, so it is not fully predictable for a B1 learner.

Etymology

Driving wheel shows a simple, literal picture: the word driving means making something move and the wheel is the round part the engine turns, so it is the wheel the engine 'drives' to make the vehicle move. That's why it means the wheel that gets the engine's 'power' and pushes the vehicle forward.