back-fire—
1. (of an engine) undergo a mistimed explosion in the cylinder with a loud noise:
- Some engines have a nasty tendency to back-fire.
2. (of firearms) explode:
- He was held liable for allowing an unqualified teacher to supervise a shooting competition during which a rifle backfired and injured a student.
3. light a fire ahead of an advancing prairie-fire in order to stop it:
- Man learned to back-fire, so but very few settlers lost their lives from prairie-fires.
4. (of a plan, etc.) have the opposite effect to what was intended:
- One of McGraw’s schemes back-fired on him.
fire back—
1. return gunfire:
- Hanson switched the Schmeisser regulator to single-shot and started to fire back.
2. = backfire 1:
- If engine fires back into carburetor, do a few smooth injections with the primer pump.