inner tube
7
2.6
- noun
- /ˈɪnər tuːb/
:
cámara de aire
- The parking lot was jammed full of dusty cars loaded down with inner tubes, bicycles, and hibachis.
- bicycle inner tube
- rubber inner tube
- tire inner tube
OK, so had to patch, had to patch the inner tube because I didn't have a replacement.
- OK, so had to patch, had to patch the inner tube because I didn't have a replacement.
Examples
-
After puncturing my bike's tire, I had to replace its inner tube before I could ride home.
-
Why don't we try it in an inner tube tomorrow?
-
I gazed at a kid alone in the world in an inner tube.
Fiction book (2001) -
Max and my father were floating in a large black inner tube garlanded with flowers.
Fiction book (1990) -
OK, so had to patch, had to patch the inner tube because I didn't have a replacement.
-
Her son, Billy, came stumbling out of his trailer with a big black inner tube bouncing around his waist.
Fiction book (1996) -
We'd go clamming in the bay with an inner tube floating out behind us, tied to my waist by a rope.
Fiction book (1995) -
We'd feel the clams with our feet and rake them up, flipping them into a net attached to the inner tube.
Fiction book (1995) -
On a hot summer day, we enjoyed floating on colorful inner tubes at the water park.
-
We spent the afternoon relaxing in the river, drifting on our inner tubes and soaking up the sun.
How Buoyant
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning is directly and compositionally derived from 'inner' (inside or nearer the center) + 'tube' (a hollow cylinder): an inner tube is literally a tube located inside a tire that holds air. This composition is semantically transparent and cross-linguistically common, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents would readily infer the MWE's meaning.
Etymology
The noun inner tube comes from the simple picture of a rubber tube placed inside a tire; the word inner points to being 'inside' and the tube is like a long balloon that 'holds air', so the phrase now means the inflatable part that keeps the tire full.