Good Morning Pete!
Those trip hammers, typically driven by waterwheel, sometimes by steam, were widely used in at least the Vallon part of Swedish iron industry. I have seen several that look much like those pictures -- at least one can easily imagine that from what remains. One trip hammer was recently reactivated, this summer, at Österbybruk and used breifly by one of very few remaining smiths. I got to watch that ceremonial event. At Österbybruk they have been systematically restoring the forge and smithy, complete with waterwheel driven bellows (piston type).
The continuous loud banging of those trip hammers was hallmark sound of Vallon iron works (järnbruk). The very elaborate manor houses of these järnbruk were nearby, meaning that everyone there lived from Monday morning to Saturday midday with the sound of these hammers ringing in their ears -- 24 hour operations.
Those trip hammers were used to hammer the long casts (pigs in english? göt in Swedish) of iron into bars for delivery to buyers. All anvils I have seen were rather simple designs. In later decades, walzing machines did much of this conversion to final product bars, at least in some järnbruk -- Karlholm Järnbruk was one.
Some järnbruk converted iron bars into produce final product. Strömsberg had exclusive right to make large anchors for Swedish navy. Vira was a järnbruk were swords (rapier, cutlass, etc.) were made for mounted and foot troops. Vira also made axes, sythes, knives, etc. Vira first got its privelidged status in 1645. Its klingesmedjor (edged weapons and tools smithy) and sliphus (where blades were finished, sharpened and made into swords) were a successful move by Sweden to develop large-scale domestic production of edged weapons, rather than import them. See Vira klingsmedja och liebruk, 1969, Norstedts, Stockholms läns kulturminnesråds skriftserie Nr 2.
Niklas
