They continue to sputter up and down, without fully recovering.
The Big Idea: Saving the World’s Most Important Fish|Kevin M. Bailey|August 9, 2013|DAILY BEAST
If the only policy tool you allow yourself to use is tax credits, your reform agenda will sputter into ineffectuality.
All Good Things...|David Frum|June 3, 2013|DAILY BEAST
And racial divisions may become worse if the economy continues to sputter.
A Racially Polarized Election Augurs Ill for Barack Obama’s Second Term|Joel Kotkin|November 7, 2012|DAILY BEAST
As his story moves into the present day, it starts to sputter.
Drowning in Beeps|Nicholas Carr|March 1, 2011|DAILY BEAST
Further on there were two female neighbors at their windows, holding candles, which the fog caused to sputter.
Notre-Dame de Paris|Victor Hugo
He could only sputter his excuses and withdraw, swearing to catch the arch-conspirator or to die in the attempt.
Graustark|George Barr McCutcheon
Even the camp-fire seemed to burn wildly; it did not glow and sputter and pale and brighten and sing like an honest camp-fire.
The Border Legion|Zane Grey
Some sputter out as they travel, and are disintegrated, while others continue to glow like a piece of heated iron, for many hours.
The Human Aura|Swami Panchadasi
In a moment he is out again with a great rush and sputter, gripping his fish and pip-pipping his exultation.
Wood Folk at School|William J. Long
British Dictionary definitions for sputter
sputter
/ (ˈspʌtə) /
verb
another word for splutter (def. 1), splutter (def. 2), splutter (def. 3)
physics
to undergo or cause to undergo a process in which atoms of a solid are removed from its surface by the impact of high-energy ions, as in a discharge tube
to coat (a film of a metal) onto (a solid surface) by using this process