Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
Wiktionary
vb. To manufacture something, especially a building, in standard components that can be fitted together on site
WordNet
v. to manufacture sections of (a building), especially in a factory, so that they can be easily transported to and rapidly assembled on a building site of buildings [syn: preassemble]
produce synthetically, artificially, or stereotypically and unoriginally
Usage examples of "prefabricate".
This was another large prefabricated warehouse, fitted with airtight doors and a powerful air-conditioning unit to maintain the scrolls in an atmosphere of optimum temperature and humidity.
He pointed, and she saw prefabricated revetments on an uncratered stretch of runway.
Durringham, a clearing hacked out of the jungle containing a single prefabricated metal grid runway, a flight-control centre, and ten hangars made from sun-bleached ezystak panels.
At the start of the preliminary stage, cargo starships delivered thirty-five dumpers into low orbit: squat, conical, atmospheric-entry craft, packed full of heavy machinery, supplies, fuel, ground vehicles, and the prefabricated sections of runway.
Thereupon he tinkered with a prefabricated frame until he had turned out a bullish-looking good guy: SA man Walter Matern.
And this for half an hour until the machinist cautiously calls him back: time to cut panels for prefabricated Navy barracks.
For all its smoked-glass pretensions it was no more than an expensive prefabricated hut dumped down in one corner of a large living space.
Above was a prefabricated office, slung between two steel girders originally added to strengthen the brick walls of the warehouse.
The house frame was the same prefabricated rod structure employed by most of the First.
The prefabricated refinery processed the crumbly stuff, turning it into thick dark bricks of protoplastic, the fodder of their building and pharmaceuticals industry.
Aaron raised it, and then dropped the bundle down through a hatch in the prefabricated dome.
This dome was twenty feet in diameter and seven feet high, made of prefabricated sections that slotted together in minutes.
Suddenly his lips curled in a merry smile, and she knew, knew, that his next response would be prefabricated, that the moment of truth had evaporated.
The camp was all prefabricated buildings, squat one-story jobs with spacious windows and red roofs.
Several of the men were putting together a prefabricated storage shed.