A tuyere, also can be spelled as tuyère, is a tube, nozzle

Nozzle

A nozzle is a device designed to control the direction or characteristics of a fluid flow as it exits an enclosed chamber or pipe via an orifice....

 or pipe

Pipe (material)

A pipe is a tubular section or hollow cylinder, usually but not necessarily of circular cross-section, used mainly to convey substances which can flow — liquids and gases , slurries, powders, masses of small solids...

 through which air is blown into a furnace

Furnace

A furnace is a device used for heating. The name derives from Latin fornax, oven.In American English and Canadian English, the term furnace on its own is generally used to describe household heating systems based on a central furnace , and sometimes as a synonym for kiln, a device used in the...

 or hearth

Hearth

In common historic and modern usage, a hearth is a brick- or stone-lined fireplace or oven often used for cooking and/or heating. For centuries, the hearth was considered an integral part of a home, often its central or most important feature...

.

Air or oxygen

Oxygen

Oxygen is the element with atomic number 8 and represented by the symbol O. Its name derives from the Greek roots ὀξύς and -γενής , because at the time of naming, it was mistakenly thought that all acids required oxygen in their composition...

 is injected into a hearth under pressure from bellows

Bellows

A bellows is a device for delivering pressurized air in a controlled quantity to a controlled location.Basically, a bellows is a deformable container which has an outlet nozzle. When the volume of the bellows is decreased, the air escapes through the outlet...

 or a blast engine or other devices. This causes the fire to be hotter in front of the blast than it would otherwise have been, enabling metals to be smelted

Smelting

Smelting is a form of extractive metallurgy; its main use is to produce a metal from its ore. This includes iron extraction from iron ore, and copper extraction and other base metals from their ores...

 or melted

Foundry

A foundry is a factory that produces metal castings. Metals are cast into shapes by melting them into a liquid, pouring the metal in a mold, and removing the mold material or casting after the metal has solidified as it cools. The most common metals processed are aluminum and cast iron...

 or made hot enough to be worked in a forge

Forge

A forge is a hearth used for forging. The term "forge" can also refer to the workplace of a smith or a blacksmith, although the term smithy is then more commonly used.The basic smithy contains a forge, also known as a hearth, for heating metals...

. This applies to any process where a blast is delivered under pressure to make a fire hotter.

The term (like many technical terms relating to ironmaking) was introduced to England with the new technology of the blast furnace

Blast furnace

A blast furnace is a type of metallurgical furnace used for smelting to produce industrial metals, generally iron.In a blast furnace, fuel and ore and flux are continuously supplied through the top of the furnace, while air is blown into the bottom of the chamber, so that the chemical reactions...

 and finery forge

Finery forge

Iron tapped from the blast furnace is pig iron, and contains significant amounts of carbon and silicon. To produce malleable wrought iron, it needs to undergo a further process. In the early modern period, this was carried out in a finery forge....

 in around 1500, and was sometimes anglicised as tu-iron.

Following the introduction of hot blast

Hot blast

Hot blast refers to the preheating of air blown into a blast furnace or other metallurgical process. This has the result of considerably reducing the fuel consumed in the process...

, tuyeres are often water-cooled..

Examples

• A bloomery
  Bloomery
  A bloomery is a type of furnace once widely used for smelting iron from its oxides. The bloomery was the earliest form of smelter capable of smelting iron. A bloomery's product is a porous mass of iron and slag called a bloom. This mix of slag and iron in the bloom is termed sponge iron, which...
  
   normally had one tuyere.
• Early blast furnaces also had one tuyere, but was fed from bellows perhaps 12 feet (3.7m) long operated by a waterwheel. During the Industrial Revolution
  Industrial Revolution
  The Industrial Revolution was a period from the 18th to the 19th century where major changes in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, transportation, and technology had a profound effect on the social, economic and cultural conditions of the times...
  
  , the blast began to be provided using steam engine
  Steam engine
  A steam engine is a heat engine that performs mechanical work using steam as its working fluid.Steam engines are external combustion engines, where the working fluid is separate from the combustion products. Non-combustion heat sources such as solar power, nuclear power or geothermal energy may be...
  
  s, initially Watt engines working blowing cylinders. Improvements in foundry practice enabled gas-tight cast iron
  Cast iron
  Cast iron is derived from pig iron, and while it usually refers to gray iron, it also identifies a large group of ferrous alloys which solidify with a eutectic. The color of a fractured surface can be used to identify an alloy. White cast iron is named after its white surface when fractured, due...
  
   pipes to be produced, enabling one engine to deliver blast to several sides of a furnace, through multiple tuyeres.
• A finery forge contained finery and chafery hearths, usually one of the latter and one to three of the former. Each hearth was equipped with its own set of bellows, blowing into it through a tuyere.
• The blacksmith
  Blacksmith
  A blacksmith is a person who creates objects from wrought iron or steel by forging the metal; that is, by using tools to hammer, bend, and cut...
  
  's hearth at his forge has a tuyere, often blown by foot-operated bellows.
• Tuyeres were also used in smelting lead
  Lead
  Lead is a main-group element in the carbon group with the symbol Pb and atomic number 82. Lead is a soft, malleable poor metal. It is also counted as one of the heavy metals. Metallic lead has a bluish-white color after being freshly cut, but it soon tarnishes to a dull grayish color when exposed...
  
   and copper
  Copper
  Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu and atomic number 29. It is a ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. Pure copper is soft and malleable; an exposed surface has a reddish-orange tarnish...
  
   in smeltmill
  Smeltmill
  Smeltmills were water-powered mills used to smelt lead or other metals.The older method of smelting lead on wind-blown bole hills began to be superseded by artificially-blown smelters. The first such furnace was built by Burchard Kranich at Makeney, Derbyshire in 1554, but produced less good lead...
  
  s.
• Modern blast furnace
  Blast furnace
  A blast furnace is a type of metallurgical furnace used for smelting to produce industrial metals, generally iron.In a blast furnace, fuel and ore and flux are continuously supplied through the top of the furnace, while air is blown into the bottom of the chamber, so that the chemical reactions...
  
  s may have up to 42 tuyeres, through which the hot blast
  Hot blast
  Hot blast refers to the preheating of air blown into a blast furnace or other metallurgical process. This has the result of considerably reducing the fuel consumed in the process...
  
   is injected in the furnace. They are usually made from copper and cooled with a water jacket
  Water jacket
  A water jacket is a water-filled void surrounding a device, typically a metal sheath having intake and outlet vents to allow water to be pumped through the void. The flow of water to an external heating or cooling device allows precise temperature control of the device.-Applications:Water jackets...
  
  to withstand the extreme temperatures.