Glenrothes · COSHH / HSG258
Statutory thorough examination and testing of local exhaust ventilation for Glenrothes workshops and production sites, keeping fume and dust control compliant with COSHH and HSE guidance HSG258.
Glenrothes
Glenrothes is Fife's second-largest town, home to around 39,000 people at the heart of the Kingdom, and one of Scotland's original post-war new towns - designated in 1948 to house the miners of the Rothes Colliery, a coal super-pit that flooded and failed before it ever delivered. The town reinvented itself as a cornerstone of Silicon Glen, and the concrete hippos of its pioneering Town Artist scheme still stand guard over its precincts.
Its working economy runs on precision electronics, advanced manufacturing and the fabrication trades, much of it grouped in the units at Southfield and Queensway industrial estates.
Wherever a Glenrothes 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 Southfield Industrial Estate units down to the smallest Glenrothes workshop, measuring capture and face velocity and issuing a plain pass-or-remedial result with every hood tagged.
By sector
Where fume, dust, mist or vapour is pulled away at the point it is made, that is LEV - and for employers in Glenrothes and across Fife it stands as their COSHH evidence.
Solder-fume and coolant-mist extraction across the town's electronics and machining plants, from Raytheon's avionics and manufacturing work at Queensway to the precision shops at Southfield that carry on the Silicon Glen legacy Glenrothes helped begin.
Steam canopies and flour-dust control in the bakeries and producers at the Fife Food and Business Centre on Southfield, where extraction keeps the air and surfaces clean around live production.
Fine-dust extraction and downdraught tables at Glenrothes joinery works and the timber trades supplied out of Eastfield, 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 Southfield and Queensway units. Since the HSE's 2019 reclassification, all welding fume - mild steel included - is treated as carcinogenic.
Spray-booth and prep-bay extraction at Glenrothes 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 science labs at Fife College's Stenton Road campus and the town's technical employers, to the containment their work demands.
On the ground in Glenrothes
We are out under Glenrothes's extraction every week. The proof that matters is the jobs, not a stock photo.
An established furniture workshop in Glenrothes had the airflow at its tool capture hoods down on the previous test, with the fan not reaching its rated speed. We measured face and capture velocities, ran smoke tests at each point and inspected the fan and filter. Renewing a tired filter brought the capture back within benchmark, and we issued a signed HSG258 report, flagging a worn part to the supervisor for their maintenance records.
The test
A statutory LEV test to HSG258 is far more than a look round. On a Glenrothes 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 Southfield 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 Glenrothes line.
Where exposure is in question - a precision electronics and engineering process, say - sampling confirms whether control is actually protecting the people at the process.
The duty
COSHH Regulation 9 puts a hard duty on the employer: any LEV controlling a hazardous substance must have a thorough examination and test at least every fourteen months, with records kept for five years.
On most Glenrothes sites - the Southfield Industrial Estate 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 Glenrothes 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 Glenrothes duty-holder.
Each system tagged with status and next-due date, so compliance is visible on the Queensway 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 precision electronics and engineering 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. We plan testing around production shifts at the Southfield Industrial Estate units, term-time access at the Glenrothes 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 Southfield Industrial Estate or a smaller Glenrothes workshop needs for their COSHH file.
Yes - the industrial estates and workshops around Southfield Industrial Estate and Queensway Industrial Estate, the university and hospital labs, and the wider Fife.
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 Southfield Industrial Estate 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 Southfield Industrial Estate unit will ask to see.
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 Glenrothes, but a Southfield Industrial Estate fabrication shop and a Kingdom Centre canopy are kept as the separate jobs they are.
Local knowledge
Hughes Aircraft opened its first plant outside the United States in Glenrothes in 1960 to make germanium and silicon diodes, and the town became an anchor of Scotland's Silicon Glen. Electronics and precision manufacturing still run through its estates, from Raytheon's avionics work at Queensway to the machine shops at Southfield. Every one of them carries a duty to control the solder fume, coolant mist and dust its work throws off. We test and certify local exhaust ventilation so the extraction reads true against its design figures.
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