rat-tail file

1. 1.

   a thin round file shaped like the tail of a rat

   Broaderfile

Questions about rat-tail file

What does rat-tail file mean?

rat-tail file means "a thin round file shaped like the tail of a rat".

Is rat-tail file a common word?

rat-tail file is banded "Rare" — specialist or archaic — most readers will not have met it. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.