gum up

verb

1. to cover, dab, or stiffen with gum
2. informal.
   to make a mess of; bungle (often in the phrase gum up the works )

Idioms and Phrases

Ruin or bungle something, as in The front office has gummed up the sales campaign thoroughly . This idiom is also put as gum up the works , as in John's changes in procedures have gummed up the works in the shipping department . [ Slang ; c. 1900]

Example Sentences

Many importers then quietly used the San Pedro ports to store containers, causing a logjam of ships waiting to berth and gumming up the entire supply chain system.

From Los Angeles Times

The housing market gummed up, people unable to move and all this at time when there is huge demand for more homes.

From BBC

He said plastic bags are problematic for material recovery facilities where they are known to gum up machinery.

From Los Angeles Times

They don’t want to be picking time-consuming fights with the Lords, or creating laws that could be gummed up with hundreds of possible amendments – helpful tweaks - from their lordships.

From BBC

Malformed proteins not only fail to carry out their tasks, they can accumulate and eventually gum up the inner workings of cells.

From Science Daily

Related Words

• bungle