toggle joint

toggle joint (plural toggle joints)

1. A mechanical linkage of the type of an elbow or knee joint, consisting of two bars so connected that they may be brought quite or nearly into a straight line, and made to produce great endwise pressure when brought into this position.
   • 2009, Ross Thomson, Structures of change in the mechanical age, page 48:

     A toggle joint, which used a lever system to multiply power, replaced the screw mechanism for forcing down the impression-forming platen.

• “toggle”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.