Bolton · COSHH / HSG258
Statutory thorough examination and testing of local exhaust ventilation for Bolton workshops and production sites, keeping fume and dust control compliant with COSHH and HSE guidance HSG258.
Bolton
Bolton is the birthplace of the spinning mule, a Greater Manchester town of around 296,000 that still runs advanced engineering and defence-aerospace manufacturing.
The work is advanced engineering - the defence-aerospace design and assembly, the alloy foundries and metallurgy, and the technical-textile and fabrication shops - across the Wingates and Middlebrook estates, with the bodyshops, print and food producers between them.
Wherever a Bolton 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 Wingates units down to the smallest Bolton 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 Bolton and the rest of Greater Manchester it is the evidence COSHH expects you to hold.
Solder-fume, bonding and machining extraction on the missile and advanced-engineering lines, where process and metal fume need capture proven.
Fume extraction over melting and casting - high-temperature metal fume where capture at source is the whole job.
On-torch extraction, fume arms and downdraught benches across the fabrication units. Since the HSE's 2019 reclassification, all welding fume - mild steel included - is treated as carcinogenic.
Dust and fibre extraction across the surviving textile and technical-textile lines, where fine fibre blinds a filter.
Spray-booth and prep-bay extraction at Bolton 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 the University of Bolton and the Royal Bolton Hospital, to the containment their work demands.
On the ground in Bolton
We are out under Bolton's extraction every week. The proof that matters is the jobs, not a stock photo.
An aerospace-alloy foundry in Bolton had the induction-furnace canopy extraction damper stuck at 10% open - slag had built up on the control cable. We cleared the slag crust, lubricated the mechanical pivot arm and measured the capture velocity at the furnace lip. It passed once cleared, with the face velocity back to the 1.2 metres per second those hot metallurgical fumes need. The radiant heat was fierce enough that it was heat-shield jackets and carbon-face respirators throughout.
The test
A statutory LEV test under HSG258 is not a visual once-over. On a Bolton system it answers three things: is the system intact, does it still capture, and does that capture match what it was designed to do.
Ductwork, hoods, filters, fans and dampers checked for damage, blockage and leakage across the Wingates 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 Bolton line.
Where exposure is in question - a defence aerospace and advanced engineering process, say - sampling confirms whether control is actually protecting the people at the process.
The duty
COSHH Regulation 9 makes it plain: any LEV controlling exposure to a hazardous substance has to be thoroughly examined and tested at intervals no greater than fourteen months, and the resulting records kept for at least five years.
For the great majority of Bolton sites, from the Wingates units to the one-man workshops, the fourteen-month deadline is what catches people out: once it passes the system is non-compliant regardless of its actual state. We carry out the examination, label every hood with its status and next-due date, and issue the report an HSE inspector or your insurer expects to see - and if a point fails, you get the number, the cause and the fix rather than a bare fail.
How it runs
Full visual and structural check of every hood, duct run, filter and fan across the Bolton 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 Bolton duty-holder.
Each system tagged with status and next-due date, so compliance is visible on the Middlebrook 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 defence aerospace and advanced engineering bay, a foundry and metallurgy bench and a lab fume cupboard can each sit on a different interval - we set the right one for every system.
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 Bolton, but a Wingates fabrication shop and a Bradshawgate canopy are kept as the separate jobs they are.
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 Wingates production line we can usually fit the re-test around your shifts. We will not pass a system that does not control exposure.
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 Wingates unit will ask to see.
Defence aerospace and advanced engineering, foundry and metallurgy, welding and fabrication, textiles and technical textiles, vehicle body and paint, and the labs of the university and hospital - the trades clustered around Wingates and Middlebrook and across the wider Greater Manchester.
Yes. A new spray booth or fume-arm install at a Bolton workshop needs a commissioning test to prove it performs to its design figures before it goes into service - we measure it and document the baseline the 14-month clock then runs from.
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 Wingates or a smaller Bolton workshop needs for their COSHH file.
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