Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(Aus.) to get drunk.

1976

D. Ireland Glass Canoe (1982) 168: I think I’ll iron myself out, jack [...] Are you going to get drunk with me?

1. to correct a situation, to put things right.

1930		J. Lait Put on the Spot 120: You can stay here, Babes, until everything’s ironed out.
1932		Western Dly Press 27 Oct. 12/4: The purpose of Mr Davies’s conversations has been to iron out difficulties.
1949		Gloucs. Echo 11 Nov. 1/1: [headline] Cabinet to Iron out Steel Plans. Compromise — or Fight.
1960		B. Kops Dream of Peter Mann Act II: Be patient boys – we’ll iron the whole thing out.
1971		Wodehouse Much Obliged, Jeeves 50: Time the great healer had ironed things out.
1989		J. Morton Lowspeak.
1999		(con. 1979–80) A. Wheatle Brixton Rock (2004) 5: We’ll have to call the Social in, then we’ll get this ironed out.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. 113: iron out 1 To fix something. Probably from ironing out wrinkles. ANZ c.1930. 2. To attack so successfully you flatten someone. Thus ironed out, exhausted or knocked senseless by fists or booze. ANZ mid C20.

2. lit. or fig., to overwhelm in a fight.

1939		P. Cheyney Don’t Get Me Wrong (1956) 120: It is just my luck that I should be the bozo who irons out Jake.
1943		Western Morn. News 16 Apr. 3/2: [headline] Allies ‘Iron Out’ Tunisia Bulges. [...] Nearly 200,000 Enemy Troops Trapped.
1976		D. Ireland Glass Canoe (1982) 49: Regularly we ironed ourselves out and we did it on purpose.
1979		G. Stewart Leveller 112: A blue started and I ironed Arty out.
1998		D. Jenkins Rude Behavior 48: ‘One of the great myths is that the Japs are smart. [...] They’ve been ironed out in California real estate’.
2003		see sense 1.
2012		(con. 1943) G.S. Manson Irish Fandango [ebook] ‘Take ya fucking foot out of the door or I’ll iron you out!’.

3. to kill, to murder.

1928–29		L. Nason White Slicker 158: We got a bunch of prisoners up there [...] in the old trench so we couldn’t iron ’em out like we intended.
1937		P. Cheyney Dames Don’t Care (1960) 18: Whoever it was ironed Sagers out will take him out some place an’ bury him.
2000		J.J. Connolly Layer Cake 8: If people keep losing their temper and ironing people out all the time it starts to lose its mystique.

4. to reform, to impose morality [? iron n. (3c)].

1963

in T.I. Rubin Sweet Daddy 42: Them that go trying to iron out everyone – do-gooders – there’s just something strictly phoney about them.