Oadby · COSHH / HSG258
Statutory thorough examination and testing of local exhaust ventilation for Oadby workshops and production sites, keeping fume and dust control compliant with COSHH and HSE guidance HSG258.
Oadby
Oadby sits four miles south-east of Leicester on the London Road, a leafy suburban town of around twenty-four thousand people in the borough of Oadby and Wigston. It is best known for Leicester Racecourse, laid out in 1883 on the town's northern edge, and for the University of Leicester Botanic Garden, sixteen acres of Edwardian gardens founded in 1921 next door.
Its working economy runs on precision engineering, plastics fabrication and the food and drink trades, much of it grouped in the light-industrial units on Kenilworth Drive and Iliffe Avenue that make up the Oadby Industrial Estate off the A6.
Every Oadby 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 Kenilworth Drive plant to the single-bench Oadby units, logging capture and face-velocity figures and returning a clear pass-or-remedial outcome with each hood identified and labelled.
By sector
Where fume, dust, mist or vapour is pulled away at the point it is made, that is LEV - and for employers in Oadby and across Leicestershire it stands as their COSHH evidence.
Oil-mist, coolant-mist and swarf extraction on the CNC and fabrication lines of the Oadby Industrial Estate, from Oadby Plastics, machining acrylic and industrial polymers since 1969, to the conveyor and component shops along Kenilworth Drive.
Steam canopies and flour-dust and spice-dust control in the bakeries and Asian food producers that supply the borough's shops and restaurants, where extraction keeps airborne dust and vapour out of the production hall.
Fine-dust extraction and downdraught tables at Oadby cabinet and joinery shops, 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 Iliffe Avenue and Kenilworth Drive units. Since the HSE's 2019 reclassification, all welding fume, mild steel included, is treated as carcinogenic.
Spray-booth and prep-bay extraction at Oadby bodyshops and MOT sites. 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 laboratories at Beauchamp College and the University of Leicester teaching facilities near the Oadby student village, to the containment their work demands.
On the ground in Oadby
We are out under Oadby's extraction every week. The proof that matters is the jobs, not a stock photo.
Control at the cutting bench in a well-known Oadby ceramics studio had fallen away, with the bench hoods hampered by a fan that wasn't reaching its rated speed. I took benchmark readings, visualised the capture at each hood and dealt with a tired filter along the way. Sealing a leaking connection brought the capture back within benchmark, and I signed off an HSG258 report for them. I also flagged a worn part to the owner so it could go in their maintenance records.
The test
A statutory LEV test under HSG258 is not a visual once-over. On an Oadby 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 Kenilworth 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 an Oadby line.
Where exposure is in question - a precision engineering and plastics 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 Oadby sites - from the Kenilworth 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 Oadby 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 Oadby duty-holder.
Each system tagged with status and next-due date, so compliance is visible on the Iliffe Avenue 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 plastics 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.
precision engineering and plastics, food and drink production, woodworking and joinery, welding and fabrication, vehicle body and paint, and laboratory fume cupboards - the trades clustered around Kenilworth Drive and Iliffe Avenue and across the wider Leicestershire.
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 Kenilworth Drive unit will ask to see.
Yes. A new spray booth or fume-arm install at an Oadby 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 Oadby, but a Kenilworth Drive fabrication shop and a Sandhurst Street canopy are kept as the separate jobs they are.
Yes. We plan testing around production shifts at the Kenilworth Drive units, term-time access at the Oadby 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 Kenilworth Drive production line we can usually fit the re-test around your shifts. We will not pass a system that does not control exposure.
Local knowledge
Oadby Plastics has fabricated and machined acrylic and industrial polymers from the town's industrial estate since 1969, one of a cluster of precision and fabrication shops working the units along Kenilworth Drive and Iliffe Avenue. Cutting, routing and machining plastic and metal throws off fine dust, swarf and coolant mist that has to be drawn off at the tool. Every one of those workshops carries a duty to control what its work puts into the air. We test and certify local exhaust ventilation so the extraction reads true against its design figures.
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