An apparatus for polishing silver, plated goods, or other burnished metal surfaces, consisting of a disc or discs of leather or cloth, or a wooden disc with a tuyère of buff leather, revolving rapidly on a spindle, and used with or without emery-powder, sand, etc., according to the class of work in hand.
1879. Cassell’s Techn. Educ., IV. 414/1. They will first be ‘bobbed’ … the finishing ‘bobs’ are made of a number of loose discs of cloth placed close together and threaded on the spindle like an old fashioned mop, the spoon is pressed against the soft pad, dressed with grease and fine powder.
1881. Greener, Gun, 252. The bobs and laps should be driven by steam power, as is the case in Birmingham.
