English proficiency tests
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From Tim Leonard:
I wonder if any English proficiency tests include deciphering things like this.
VHM: It was only twenty or so years ago that I learned about the word "beater" for a cheap, high-mileage, beat-up car that still performs reasonably well.
Selected readings
DaveK said,
February 5, 2026 @ 12:06 am
Did that give him enough juice to turn it over or did he need a jump?
JimG said,
February 5, 2026 @ 1:28 am
@DaveK , It takes very little speed for a moving manual transmission car, when the driver has the ignition key turned to ON and lets out the clutch, to turn the engine and produce enough spark as the next piston reaches the ignition point, Once the first cylinder fires, the engine will almost always continue running. Popping the clutch works when rolling forward or in reverse. I'd never heard the "flintstoning" term, but it's absolutely and immediately recognizable for anyone who ever saw the cartoon show. .
I hope to drive my 2007 Honda Element with its 5-speed manual shifter until it's a grease spot on the highway.
AntC said,
February 5, 2026 @ 1:33 am
'beater' I've never heard in that sense.
Here's some Antipodean terminology for same https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=A7xXoN8o4T0
Huntly said,
February 5, 2026 @ 3:51 am
Did this [push the car and pop the clutch] many a time back in the day.
Laura Morland said,
February 5, 2026 @ 5:01 am
@JimG, I loved your technical explanation, but I believe that DaveK was continuing the narrative in the same vein, using terms no ordinary ESL learner would understand.
@VHM, "Beater" is a relatively new member of my vocabulary pack as well. And like JimG, I've never encountered the verb "to flintstone," but it's immediately understandable to anyone who grew up in the U.S. in the 60s, or in the era when the live-action film came out (whenever that was — all I recall is hearing that the producers were itching to sign Sharon Stone, but for her it was a hard pass).
Richard Hershberger said,
February 5, 2026 @ 5:14 am
This use of "beater" is so familiar to me that I am surprised to find it doesn't appear in Green's Dictionary of Slang. I would have guessed it to be plenty old for that. There are multiple entries for this sense in Urban Dictionary dating at least 2003.
ajay said,
February 5, 2026 @ 6:21 am
It doesn't seem impossible for a basic English speaker to get the gist of that. Omitting everything that isn't a common word whose literal meaning is the correct one in this case: "The battery was dead in my ??? this morning. It's a ??? so I ???? it down the drive and ???? the clutch."
Whatever a "beater" is, it has a battery and a clutch – so it's a car. What do you do down a drive with a car? You push it. So "flintstoned" means "push". And if you're pushing a car with a dead battery down your drive, it's because you're going to start it by letting in the clutch – so "popped" means "let in". I think the only puzzling bit might be "stick" meaning "manual transmission" because in so many countries manual transmissions are the standard, so it wouldn't be worth remarking on.
Brian Ogilvie said,
February 5, 2026 @ 6:24 am
We called those cars “beaters” or “winter beaters” in Michigan in my childhood (1970s). The OED’s earliest citation is to a 1950 newspaper ad from Racine, Wisconsin,
KeithB said,
February 5, 2026 @ 8:37 am
I first came across 'beater' in the '70s in an LA Times article about folks that would fly private planes to Big Bear (Currently famous for the Eagle-Cam) and have a beater at the Big Bear airport to get around. Being a beater, they were unconcerned about leaving it for a long time, or even if it got stolen.
David Marjanović said,
February 5, 2026 @ 8:43 am
Or anyone who grew up outside the US and watched TV in, say, the 90s. The Flintstones are just part of a classical education.
Julia said,
February 5, 2026 @ 9:18 am
I thought "beater" was more widely known than these comments reflect but I grew up in Michigan, and I note Brian's comment so I guess it's regional
Mai Kuha said,
February 5, 2026 @ 9:21 am
What drives me bonkers is navigating six things like this before breakfast every day for decades and then some American suddenly waking up and remembering "oh, she's a foreigner and doesn't know things" and undertaking to explain to me traffic lights or the definition of noon vs. midnight.
Yerushalmi said,
February 5, 2026 @ 9:37 am
Native English speaker here, and I was wondering how the hell one would flintstone an egg beater.
Jonathan Lundell said,
February 5, 2026 @ 10:02 am
”Flintstoning” is new to me, but of course recognizable. I’d be inclined to reserve it for that particular variety of push-start in which one sits in the car with one foot extended out the door, helping to propel it down the drive[way], pretty much limited to cases in which the driveway is also favorably inclined.
Mark Metcalf said,
February 5, 2026 @ 10:06 am
Similarly, some of my colleagues stationed in Guam used to refer to their beaters as "Guam bombs."
https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Guam+Bomb
KeithB said,
February 5, 2026 @ 10:12 am
I saw a sticker on a car that had an image of the manual transmission "H-pattern", and said:
"This car equipped with an anti-millennial theft prevention device"
Jerry Packard said,
February 5, 2026 @ 10:54 am
Jonathan Lundell’s view matched mine, having done it many times in a VW bug or ‘63 Corvair.