Bideford · COSHH / HSG258
Statutory thorough examination and testing of local exhaust ventilation for Bideford workshops and production sites, keeping fume and dust control compliant with COSHH and HSE guidance HSG258.
Bideford
Bideford is a port town on the Torridge estuary in North Devon, home to around 17,000 people. Once ranked among England's busiest ports, it launched over 800 wooden sailing ships from its riverbanks during the nineteenth century.
The town's working trades cluster on the Caddsdown Industrial Park and the older Clovelly Road estate, from joinery shops and vehicle bays to marine and engineering firms drawing on the estuary's long boatbuilding tradition.
Wherever a Bideford process releases fume, dust, mist or vapour, COSHH puts the duty on you to control it at source, and the extraction that does so is LEV - subject to a thorough examination and test at least every fourteen months. We work across the range, from the Caddsdown Industrial Park units down to the smallest Bideford workshop, measuring capture and face velocity and issuing a plain pass-or-remedial result with every hood tagged.
By sector
Any system that draws fume, dust, mist or vapour off at source counts as LEV, and across Bideford and the rest of Devon it is the evidence COSHH expects you to hold.
Sawdust and fine wood-dust extraction for cabinetmakers and building-supply workshops off Clovelly Road. Hardwood dust is a recognised cause of nasal cancer, so we test that hoods and ducting pull it clear of the operator's breathing zone.
Resin and styrene fume control for the GRP and repair yards along the Torridge and over at Appledore. Laminating releases solvent vapour that local extraction must draw away before it reaches the laminator.
Oil-mist and coolant-mist extraction on the lathes and machining centres at Caddsdown. Fine metalworking-fluid aerosol reaches deep into the lungs, so filtration is checked against the airflow the plant was specified to move.
On-torch extraction, fume arms and downdraught benches across the Caddsdown Industrial Park and Clovelly Road Industrial Estate units. Since the HSE's 2019 reclassification, all welding fume - mild steel included - is treated as carcinogenic.
Spray-booth and prep-bay extraction at Bideford bodyshops. Two-pack paints release isocyanates - the leading cause of occupational asthma - so booth airflow is examined to its design figure.
Fume-cupboard face-velocity testing for Petroc and North Devon District Hospital, to the containment their work demands.
On the ground in Bideford
We are out under Bideford's extraction every week. The proof that matters is the jobs, not a stock photo.
A school science lab in Bideford had the capture velocity at its fume cupboards drop below benchmark, with the fan not reaching its rated speed. We ran velocity and smoke tests across the fume cupboards and replaced a worn impeller before re-checking, and all points passed on re-test, with a thorough examination and test certificate. The benches ran wet chemistry, so the containment was examined to its safe working face.
The test
A statutory LEV test to HSG258 is far more than a look round. On a Bideford system it settles three questions: is the ductwork and plant intact, does it still capture at the hood, and does that capture still match the design.
Ductwork, hoods, filters, fans and dampers checked for damage, blockage and leakage across the Caddsdown Industrial Park units - the faults that quietly kill capture.
Face and capture velocities, static pressures and airflows measured at each hood with calibrated instruments - numbers, not opinion.
Readings compared to the system's commissioning figures, so drift from as-designed is caught before it becomes a failure on a Bideford line.
Where exposure is in question - a joinery and woodworking process, say - sampling confirms whether control is actually protecting the people at the process.
The duty
Under Regulation 9 of COSHH the obligation sits squarely with the employer - any LEV that controls a hazardous substance needs a thorough examination and test at least every fourteen months, and the records held for five years.
On most Bideford sites - the Caddsdown Industrial Park units and the smaller workshops alike - it is the fourteen-month clock that bites: let it lapse and the system is non-compliant that day, however well it seems to run. We examine it, tag each hood with its status and next-due date, and hand over the report an HSE inspector or insurer will want. Where something fails you get the reading, the cause and the remedy - never just a red sticker.
How it runs
Full visual and structural check of every hood, duct run, filter and fan across the Bideford site.
Calibrated velocity, pressure and airflow readings at each extraction point.
A COSHH-compliant report: results against benchmark, clear pass or fail, and plain-English actions for the Bideford duty-holder.
Each system tagged with status and next-due date, so compliance is visible on the Clovelly Road Industrial Estate floor.
Questions
Under COSHH Regulation 9, most local exhaust ventilation needs a thorough examination and test at least every 14 months, with higher-risk processes more often. A joinery and woodworking bay, a boatbuilding and marine trades bench and a lab fume cupboard can each sit on a different interval - we set the right one for every system.
Yes. We plan testing around production shifts at the Caddsdown Industrial Park units, term-time access at the Bideford university labs, and normal hours at smaller workshops, so the examination never stops the line.
Yes. Each hood is labelled with its status and next-due date, and you get the HSG258 report and system schematic for your COSHH file - the record an HSE inspector visiting a Caddsdown Industrial Park unit will ask to see.
We record it as remedial and set out what is needed - airflow, ductwork, filtration or capture at the hood. You do the work and we re-test, and on a Caddsdown Industrial Park production line we can usually fit the re-test around your shifts. We will not pass a system that does not control exposure.
No. LEV testing is a statutory examination of fume and dust control to COSHH and HSG258, with capture and face-velocity readings; TR19 is kitchen grease and fire risk. We do both across Bideford, but a Caddsdown Industrial Park fabrication shop and a Quay canopy are kept as the separate jobs they are.
A dated report to the HSG258 method, the readings taken, a pass or remedial outcome for each hood, and system labelling - the evidence a duty-holder at Caddsdown Industrial Park or a smaller Bideford workshop needs for their COSHH file.
joinery and woodworking, boatbuilding and marine trades, engineering and CNC machining, welding and fabrication, vehicle body and paint, and lab fume cupboards - the trades clustered around Caddsdown Industrial Park and Clovelly Road Industrial Estate and across the wider Devon.
Local knowledge
The Long Bridge has spanned the Torridge at Bideford since medieval times, its twenty-four arches rebuilt in stone from around 1474 and every one a different width. The masons who raised it worked to tolerances the eye can still read six centuries on. Local extraction survey work asks the same exactness: we measure face velocities and capture rates against the figures an LEV system was designed to hit, then log every reading so a Bideford workshop can prove its controls actually work.
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