pipes

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of pipe.

   Workers dug up the street to reach the broken water pipes.

   Frost cracked the metal pipes behind the wall.

   Note

   An ordinary -s plural that covers very different objects: flutes and other wind instruments, the tubes of an organ, and the rigid lines that carry water or steam. Context does the sorting. Burst pipes are plumbing, and tuned pipes are music. The same spelling also serves as the present-tense verb (the utility pipes gas), so a following object usually signals the verb, not the noun.

2. 2
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present of pipe.

   The utility pipes natural gas to thousands of homes.

   A lone bird pipes its morning call across the field.

   Note

   One -s form carries verbs of two shapes. With an object, it plays or carries something: a piper pipes a tune, and a utility pipes gas to homes. Without one, it names a sound or a change. A bird pipes, a queen bee pipes at certain stages of development, and in metalworking an ingot pipes when it turns hollow as it solidifies.

3. 3
   nounfiguratively

   A person's vocal power, especially the strength and quality of a singing voice.

   Like a finely tuned instrument that produces a rich, full sound.

   The tenor showed off his pipes during the audition.

   After years of training, she developed remarkable pipes.

   Similarvoice, lungs, vocals

   Note

   The image behind this figurative use is the body as an instrument, with lungs imagined as pipework and breath driven through tubes. It is mostly a word of praise for singers with power, as in someone showing off their pipes or having great pipes. It stays plural, and nobody has a single pipe in this sense.

4. 4
   nounfiguratively

   Well-developed biceps; large, muscular upper arms.

   Like coiled rope drawn tight beneath the skin.

   The bodybuilder's pipes strained against his shirt sleeves.

   Regular training gave him impressive pipes.

   Similarbiceps, guns, arms

5. 5
   noun

   A pipe organ; a large keyboard instrument that produces tone by driving air through sets of tuned metal or wooden pipes.

   The cathedral's pipes resounded through the nave as the organist began the prelude.

   Restoring the great pipes above the altar took the craftsmen nearly three years.

   Similarorgan

   Note

   Here a plural names one instrument. The organ is called after the many tubes that sound it, so the cathedral's pipes can mean the whole organ, not a count of its parts. Because the ordinary plural also covers organ pipes taken one by one, the sentence decides which is meant. Restoring the pipes may mean one instrument, while three cracked pipes means individual tubes.

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