Harrow · COSHH / HSG258
Statutory thorough examination and testing of local exhaust ventilation for Harrow workshops and production sites, keeping fume and dust control compliant with COSHH and HSE guidance HSG258.
Harrow
Harrow is a north-west London borough of around 261,000, home to the historic Harrow School and, at Wealdstone, the former Kodak factory.
The work is light industry and food - the metal fabrication and toolroom engineering of the Wealdstone industrial belt where the Kodak works once stood, the spice-grinding and cash-and-carry food packing of the borough's large South Asian food trade, and the printing and pharmaceutical packing - across the Headstone Drive and Honeypot Lane estates, with the bodyshops between them.
Wherever a Harrow 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 Headstone Drive units down to the smallest Harrow 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 Harrow and the rest of Greater London it is the evidence COSHH expects you to hold.
Grinding sparks, lathe mist and weld fume drawn off the benches of the Wealdstone toolroom and light-engineering units, where fine metal dust and cutting-oil mist have to be caught at the tool before they reach the operator.
Steam, flour dust and spice-grinding particulate pulled off the lines of the borough's South Asian food producers and cash-and-carry packers, where the airborne organic dust is both a lung hazard and an explosion risk.
Ink-solvent vapour off the press lines and fume-cupboard extract in the pharmaceutical packing rooms, where the VOC load and the powder handling each need their own capture and a proven face velocity.
On-torch extraction, fume arms and downdraught benches across the Headstone Drive and Honeypot Lane units. Since the HSE's 2019 reclassification, all welding fume - mild steel included - is treated as carcinogenic.
Spray-booth and prep-bay extraction at Harrow 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 Westminster Harrow campus and Northwick Park Hospital, to the containment their work demands.
On the ground in Harrow
We are out under Harrow's extraction every week. The proof that matters is the jobs, not a stock photo.
A college woodwork and carpentry shop in Harrow had the central wood-shavings extraction ductwork sagging, dropping heavy chips out and blocking the branch line. We re-aligned the sagging run with rigid overhead hangers, cleared the packed chip blockage and measured the transport velocity. It passed once levelled and cleared, with the velocity at 21 metres per second to stop future dropout. The test was scheduled into the spring half-term so no students were in the workshop.
The test
A statutory LEV test to HSG258 is far more than a look round. On a Harrow 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 Headstone Drive 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 Harrow line.
Where exposure is in question - a light engineering and fabrication 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 most Harrow sites - from the Headstone Drive units to the smaller workshops - the fourteen-month clock is the one that bites: miss it and the system is non-compliant the day it lapses, whatever its condition. We examine, label each hood with its status and next-due date, and issue the report an HSE inspector or your insurer will ask to see. If something fails, you get the reading, the cause and the fix - not just a red sticker.
How it runs
Full visual and structural check of every hood, duct run, filter and fan across the Harrow 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 Harrow duty-holder.
Each system tagged with status and next-due date, so compliance is visible on the Honeypot 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 light engineering and fabrication bay, a food manufacturing and distribution bench and a lab fume cupboard can each sit on a different interval - we set the right one for every system.
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 Headstone Drive unit will ask to see.
Light engineering and fabrication, food manufacturing and distribution, printing and pharmaceuticals, welding and fabrication, vehicle body and paint, and the labs of the university campus and hospital - the trades clustered around Headstone Drive and Honeypot Lane and across the wider Greater London.
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 Headstone Drive or a smaller Harrow workshop needs for their COSHH file.
Yes. A new spray booth or fume-arm install at a Harrow 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.
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 Headstone Drive 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 Headstone Drive units, term-time access at the Harrow university labs, and normal hours at smaller workshops, so the examination never stops the line.
Phoenix Duct Clean · by the numbers
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