Rotherham · COSHH / HSG258
Statutory thorough examination and testing of local exhaust ventilation for Rotherham workshops and production sites, keeping fume and dust control compliant with COSHH and HSE guidance HSG258.
Rotherham
Rotherham is a steel town of around 266,000, still forging and casting metal and now home to the Advanced Manufacturing Park with Boeing, Rolls-Royce and McLaren.
The heavy work is steel and advanced manufacturing - the forging, casting and heat treatment, the speciality-steel making, and the aerospace and composite research at the Advanced Manufacturing Park - across Waverley and the Templeborough estate, with the fabrication and bodyshops between them.
Each of those Rotherham 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 Waverley units to the one-bench Rotherham workshops, taking capture and face-velocity readings and leaving a clear pass or remedial verdict with the hoods labelled.
By sector
If a process captures fume, dust, mist or vapour at source, that capture system is LEV - and across Rotherham and the wider South Yorkshire it is your evidence under COSHH.
Fume and grinding extraction across the forging, casting and heat-treatment lines, where high-temperature metal fume needs capture at source.
Sanding, machining and fume extraction on the aerospace and composite lines at the Advanced Manufacturing Park, where carbon dust and resin fume need capture proven.
Weld-fume and dust extraction on the heavy-engineering lines, where metal fume is captured at the bench.
On-torch extraction, fume arms and downdraught benches across the Waverley and Templeborough units. Since the HSE's 2019 reclassification, all welding fume - mild steel included - is treated as carcinogenic.
Spray-booth and prep-bay extraction at Rotherham 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 University Centre Rotherham and Rotherham Hospital, to the containment their work demands.
On the ground in Rotherham
We are out under Rotherham's extraction every week. The proof that matters is the jobs, not a stock photo.
A steel forging and heat-treatment works in Rotherham had a high-temperature canopy hood hanging crooked on a broken guide wire, missing the main thermal plume off the press. We re-aligned the hood on temporary heavy chains and measured the capture velocities at the forging-press lip. It failed on the orientation - the airflow was fine but the crooked hood was not trapping the ascending heat. It was an extreme environment, with overhead gantry cranes moving white-hot billets while we tested.
The test
A statutory LEV test to HSG258 is far more than a look round. On a Rotherham 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 Waverley 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 Rotherham line.
Where exposure is in question - a steel, forging and heat treatment 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.
Across most Rotherham sites - the Waverley plant and the smaller units alike - it is the fourteen-month interval that trips people up, because a lapsed test leaves the system non-compliant from that date whatever its real condition. We run the examination, mark every hood with its result and next-due date, and produce the report your insurer or an HSE inspector will look for, and any failed point comes back with its reading, its cause and the fix rather than a bare red tag.
How it runs
Full visual and structural check of every hood, duct run, filter and fan across the Rotherham 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 Rotherham duty-holder.
Each system tagged with status and next-due date, so compliance is visible on the Templeborough 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 steel, forging and heat treatment bay, an advanced manufacturing and composites bench and a lab fume cupboard can each sit on a different interval - we set the right one for every system.
Yes - the industrial estates and workshops around Waverley and Templeborough, the university and hospital labs, and the wider South Yorkshire.
Steel, forging and heat treatment, advanced manufacturing and composites, heavy engineering, welding and fabrication, vehicle body and paint, and the labs of the university centre and hospital - the trades clustered around Waverley and Templeborough and across the wider South Yorkshire.
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 Waverley or a smaller Rotherham workshop needs for their COSHH file.
Yes. A new spray booth or fume-arm install at a Rotherham 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. We plan testing around production shifts at the Waverley units, term-time access at the Rotherham university labs, and normal hours at smaller workshops, so the examination never stops the line.
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 Rotherham, but a Waverley fabrication shop and a Wellgate canopy are kept as the separate jobs they are.
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