Haywards Heath · COSHH / HSG258
Statutory thorough examination and testing of local exhaust ventilation for Haywards Heath workshops and production sites, keeping fume and dust control compliant with COSHH and HSE guidance HSG258.
Haywards Heath
Haywards Heath is a Mid Sussex commuter town of around 35,000 people that barely existed until the railway made it. When Cuckfield's landowners rejected the London and Brighton line in 1825, the tracks were laid instead across a barren stretch of common between Cuckfield and Lindfield, the station opened in 1841, and the new town grew up so fast that it eclipsed both of its far older neighbours.
Its working economy is split between the office quarter that grew up around Boltro Road and Perrymount Road, home to insurer 1st Central and its several hundred staff, and the light-industrial and trade units at Bridge Road Business Park beside the railway and the factory units out at Bolney Grange.
Every Haywards Heath 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 Bridge Road Business Park plant to the single-bench Haywards Heath units, logging capture and face-velocity figures and returning a clear pass-or-remedial outcome with each hood identified and labelled.
By sector
A system that catches fume, dust, mist or vapour at the point it is released is LEV, and for Haywards Heath employers and others across West Sussex it is the record COSHH looks for first.
Oil-mist and coolant-mist extraction on CNC machining centres and lathes in the light-industrial units at Bridge Road Business Park and along Burrell Road, where fine airborne mist has to be drawn off at the machine before it reaches the operator.
Steam-canopy and flour-dust control in the bakeries, kitchens and food units that supply the town centre and the trade counters clustered at Bridge Road, where extraction keeps heat, steam and dust off the production floor.
Fine-dust extraction and downdraught tables at Haywards Heath joinery shops and fit-out firms, supplied by the timber and building merchants Howdens, Jewson and Parker Building Supplies on Bridge Road, capturing hardwood and MDF dust at the tool.
On-torch extraction, fume arms and downdraught benches across the fabrication units at Bridge Road Business Park and Burrell Road. Since the HSE's 2019 reclassification, all welding fume - mild steel included - is treated as carcinogenic.
Spray-booth and prep-bay extraction at the town bodyshops and MOT and repair units. Two-pack paints release isocyanates - the leading cause of occupational asthma - so booth airflow is examined against its design figure.
Fume-cupboard face-velocity testing for the pathology and diagnostic laboratories at the Princess Royal Hospital, checked to the containment their work demands.
On the ground in Haywards Heath
We are out under Haywards Heath's extraction every week. The proof that matters is the jobs, not a stock photo.
An established bodyshop in Haywards Heath had lost control at the paint line, the spray booth affected by a slipping fan drive belt. We measured face and capture velocities, ran smoke tests at each point and inspected the fan and filter. One point failed at first on a worn impeller and passed after remedial work, all captured in a full LEV report for the COSHH file. We worked around the shop's changeover so production wasn't disturbed.
The test
A statutory LEV test to HSG258 is far more than a look round. On a Haywards Heath 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 Bridge Road Business Park 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 Haywards Heath 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
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 Haywards Heath sites - from the Bridge Road Business Park 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 Haywards Heath 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 Haywards Heath duty-holder.
Each system tagged with status and next-due date, so compliance is visible on the Bolney Grange Industrial Park 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. We plan testing around production shifts at the Bridge Road Business Park units, term-time access at the Haywards Heath university labs, and normal hours at smaller workshops, so the examination never stops the line.
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 Bridge Road Business Park production line we can usually fit the re-test around your shifts. We will not pass a system that does not control exposure.
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 Haywards Heath, but a Bridge Road Business Park fabrication shop and a The Broadway 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 Bridge Road Business Park or a smaller Haywards Heath workshop needs for their COSHH file.
Yes. A new spray booth or fume-arm install at a Haywards Heath 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.
Yes - the industrial estates and workshops around Bridge Road Business Park and Bolney Grange Industrial Park, the university and hospital labs, and the wider West Sussex.
Local knowledge
Haywards Heath railway station opened in 1841 and for a few weeks was the southern terminus of the London and Brighton Railway before the line pushed on to the coast. The land beside the tracks at Bridge Road became the town's industrial and trade quarter, and it still carries the machine shops, fabricators and workshops that keep the town working. Every one of them has 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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