Stuckofen Furnace
This furnace or bloomary was formerly employed in some parts of Germany as a direct method of producing malleable iron from the ore, but it has been gradually abandoned in favor of the less direct but more economical methods now in vogue. The furnace is about fifteen feet high and thirty inches in diameter at the hearth--the latter having but one arch, which serves for inserting the tuyere, and also for taking out the bloom. The hearth is first filled with charcoal and lighted, after which the roasted ore and charcoal charged alternately, when the tuyere is inserted and blast supplied from a bellows driven by a convenient water-wheel. Slag is tapped from time to time and the metal falls to the hearth. After about twenty-four hours have elapsed the blast ceases, the tuyere is drawn out, breast removed, and the bloom lifted out and conveyed to the shingling-hammer for consolidation. Subsequent operations after the usual methods result in bar-iron. See SHINGLING; PUDDLING; etc.