Cheltenham · COSHH / HSG258
Statutory thorough examination and testing of local exhaust ventilation for Cheltenham workshops and production sites, keeping fume and dust control compliant with COSHH and HSE guidance HSG258.
Cheltenham
Cheltenham is a Regency spa town of around 118,000 in Gloucestershire, home to GCHQ, the Cheltenham Festival and a cyber and aerospace cluster.
The work is aerospace and high-tech - the precision engineering and aerospace, the electronics and cyber-technology manufacture, and the food and drink manufacturing - across the Kingsditch and Lansdown estates, with the bodyshops and labs among them.
Each of those Cheltenham processes throws fume, dust, mist or vapour into the workplace air, and COSHH demands it is captured at source - that capture system is local exhaust ventilation, and it must be thoroughly examined and tested at least every fourteen months. We cover the lot, from the Kingsditch units to the one-bench Cheltenham workshops, taking capture and face-velocity readings and leaving a clear pass or remedial verdict with the hoods labelled.
By sector
A system that catches fume, dust, mist or vapour at the point it is released is LEV, and for Cheltenham employers and others across Gloucestershire it is the record COSHH looks for first.
Machining, grinding and fume extraction across the aerospace and precision-engineering lines, where metal dust and mist need capture at source.
Solder-fume, solvent and conformal-coating extraction across the electronics and cyber-technology lines, where fume needs capture proven.
Steam, dust and mist extraction across the food and drink producers, where organic dust is both a health and a combustion risk.
On-torch extraction, fume arms and downdraught benches across the Kingsditch and Lansdown units. Since the HSE's 2019 reclassification, all welding fume - mild steel included - is treated as carcinogenic.
Spray-booth and prep-bay extraction at Cheltenham 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 Gloucestershire and Cheltenham General Hospital, to the containment their work demands.
On the ground in Cheltenham
We are out under Cheltenham's extraction every week. The proof that matters is the jobs, not a stock photo.
A pharmaceutical packaging cleanroom in Cheltenham had the canopy over a blister-packing machine drawing too much air - it was lifting the light empty pill blisters off the line into the ducting. We adjusted the branch-line blast-gate damper to bring the volumetric flow back to design and re-tested the face velocity. It passed once balanced, holding 0.55 metres per second to capture the dust without disturbing the packaging. It was an ISO Class 7 cleanroom, so full Tyvek suits, hairnets, beard snoods and dedicated overshoes were the rule.
The test
A statutory LEV test under HSG258 is not a visual once-over. On a Cheltenham 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 Kingsditch 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 Cheltenham line.
Where exposure is in question - an aerospace and precision engineering process, say - sampling confirms whether control is actually protecting the people at the process.
The duty
The duty is written into COSHH Regulation 9: where LEV controls a hazardous substance, the employer must have it thoroughly examined and tested at least every fourteen months and keep the records for five years.
For the great majority of Cheltenham sites, from the Kingsditch 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 Cheltenham 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 Cheltenham duty-holder.
Each system tagged with status and next-due date, so compliance is visible on the Lansdown 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. An aerospace and precision engineering bay, an electronics and cyber-tech manufacture bench and a lab fume cupboard can each sit on a different interval - we set the right one for every system.
Yes. A new spray booth or fume-arm install at a Cheltenham 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.
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 Cheltenham, but a Kingsditch fabrication shop and a Montpellier 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 Kingsditch or a smaller Cheltenham workshop needs for their COSHH file.
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 Kingsditch production line we can usually fit the re-test around your shifts. We will not pass a system that does not control exposure.
Yes. We plan testing around production shifts at the Kingsditch units, term-time access at the Cheltenham university labs, and normal hours at smaller workshops, so the examination never stops the line.
Yes - the industrial estates and workshops around Kingsditch and Lansdown, the university and hospital labs, and the wider Gloucestershire.
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