A unit of kinematic viscosity (how a fluid's thickness changes with movement), equal to one hundredth of a stoke.
From Latin 'centum' (hundred) + 'stoke,' named after Sir George Stokes, the Irish physicist who studied fluid motion in the 19th century. Kinematic viscosity measures how easily a fluid flows relative to its density.
Motor oil grades are actually measured in centistokes—that's what those numbers like '10W-30' mean in terms of how the oil flows at different temperatures, which engineers carefully control so your engine doesn't seize up!
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