Brighouse · COSHH / HSG258
Statutory thorough examination and testing of local exhaust ventilation for Brighouse workshops and production sites, keeping fume and dust control compliant with COSHH and HSE guidance HSG258.
Brighouse
Brighouse sits on the River Calder in Calderdale, four miles east of Halifax, a Yorkshire mill town that grew from just 55 houses in 1753 into a bustling centre of textile, wire and valve making. Its name is known the world over through the Brighouse and Rastrick Brass Band, whose 1977 recording of The Floral Dance reached number two in the charts and sold more than a million copies.
Its working economy still turns on precision engineering, food production and the fabrication trades, much of it grouped in the units along Birds Royd Lane and the Armytage Road Industrial Estate on the valley floor.
Every Brighouse process that gives off fume, dust, mist or vapour falls under COSHH, which requires the contamination held at source by local exhaust ventilation and that LEV thoroughly examined and tested at least every fourteen months. We test right across the site, from the Armytage Road Industrial Estate plant to the single-bench Brighouse units, logging capture and face-velocity figures and returning a clear pass-or-remedial outcome with each hood identified and labelled.
By sector
If a process captures fume, dust, mist or vapour at source, that capture system is LEV - and across Brighouse and the wider West Yorkshire it is your evidence under COSHH.
Oil-mist and coolant-mist extraction on CNC machining centres and turning shops, in the town that built J. Blakeborough and Sons into a world-renowned valve and hydrant maker employing more than 1,200 at Woodhouse Works on Birds Royd Lane.
Steam canopies and flour-dust control in Brighouse bakeries and food plants, in a town whose Sugden's flour mill milled off Mill Royd Street from 1829 and whose trade once ran on confectionery as well as cloth.
Fine-dust extraction and downdraught tables at Brighouse cabinet shops and joinery works, where hardwood and MDF dust is captured at the tool before it reaches the lungs.
On-torch extraction, fume arms and downdraught benches across the Armytage Road and Birds Royd units. Since the HSE's 2019 reclassification, all welding fume - mild steel included - is treated as carcinogenic.
Spray-booth and prep-bay extraction at Brighouse 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 college teaching rooms and technical laboratories serving the town, to the containment their work demands.
On the ground in Brighouse
We are out under Brighouse's extraction every week. The proof that matters is the jobs, not a stock photo.
An upholstery workshop in Brighouse had the airflow at its saw and sander hoods falling away since the last test, pointing to a slipping fan drive belt. We put the system through a full thorough examination and test, with velocity readings, smoke visualisation and a filter check. The LEV passed on re-test across the extraction hoods, and we drew up a full LEV report for the COSHH file. We slotted the job into a quiet bank holiday to suit the foreman.
The test
A statutory LEV test under HSG258 is not a visual once-over. On a Brighouse 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 Armytage Road Industrial Estate 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 Brighouse line.
Where exposure is in question - a precision engineering and manufacturing 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.
Across most Brighouse sites - the Armytage Road Industrial Estate plant and the smaller units alike - it is the fourteen-month interval that trips people up, because a lapsed test leaves the system non-compliant from that date whatever its real condition. We run the examination, mark every hood with its result and next-due date, and produce the report your insurer or an HSE inspector will look for, and any failed point comes back with its reading, its cause and the fix rather than a bare red tag.
How it runs
Full visual and structural check of every hood, duct run, filter and fan across the Brighouse 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 Brighouse duty-holder.
Each system tagged with status and next-due date, so compliance is visible on the Birds Royd Lane 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 precision engineering and manufacturing bay, a food and drink production bench and a lab fume cupboard can each sit on a different interval - we set the right one for every system.
Yes - the industrial estates and workshops around Armytage Road Industrial Estate and Birds Royd Lane, the university and hospital labs, and the wider West Yorkshire.
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 Brighouse, but an Armytage Road Industrial Estate fabrication shop and a Commercial Street canopy are kept as the separate jobs they are.
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 an Armytage Road Industrial Estate unit will ask to see.
precision engineering and manufacturing, food and drink production, woodworking and joinery, welding and fabrication, vehicle body and paint, and laboratory fume cupboards - the trades clustered around Armytage Road Industrial Estate and Birds Royd Lane and across the wider West Yorkshire.
Yes. We plan testing around production shifts at the Armytage Road Industrial Estate units, term-time access at the Brighouse university labs, and normal hours at smaller workshops, so the examination never stops the line.
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 Armytage Road Industrial Estate or a smaller Brighouse workshop needs for their COSHH file.
Local knowledge
Robert Blakeborough began his first valve experiments in Brighouse in the 1820s, and by the late nineteenth century J. Blakeborough and Sons had grown into a world-renowned valve and hydrant maker at Woodhouse Works on Birds Royd Lane, at its peak employing more than 1,200 people until the firm closed in 1989. That precision-engineering instinct still runs through the town's machine shops and fabricators, and every one of them carries a duty to control the mist, fume and dust its work throws off. We test and certify local exhaust ventilation to the standard COSHH sets, so the extraction reads true against its design figures.
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