go to great lengths

Verb

go to great lengths (third-person singular simple present goes to great lengths, present participle going to great lengths, simple past went to great lengths, past participle gone to great lengths)

1. (idiomatic) To make a major effort; to be very careful when doing something, especially to an extreme or excessive degree.
   • The most surprising thing was to discover that each job had its little tricks, peculiarities that had been learned in the experience of years, and one of the really pleasing features was the unlimited patience and kindliness of the chargehands and fitters, who would go to great lengths to teach the...1944 September and October, A Former Pupil, “Some Memories of Crewe Works—I”, in Railway Magazine, page 283
   • […] They said good-bye on the eleventh, and the Portuguese noblemen saw him off, going to great lengths to show him respect."2008, José Rodrigues does Santos, Codex 632: The Secret Identity of Christopher Columbus (trans. from the Portuguese by Alison Entrekin), William Morrow (2008), page 262

   Synonyms:

   bend over backwards, go to the ends of the earth, move heaven and earth