Smethwick · COSHH / HSG258
Statutory thorough examination and testing of local exhaust ventilation for Smethwick workshops and production sites, keeping fume and dust control compliant with COSHH and HSE guidance HSG258.
Smethwick
Smethwick is a Black Country town in Sandwell, around 56,000, the home of the Chance Brothers glassworks that glazed the Crystal Palace and of the new Midland Metropolitan University Hospital.
The signature trade is metalworking - the engineering and metal-rolling of the Black Country, the foundry and springs work, and the plastics and manufacturing - across the Middlemore Industrial Estate and Roebuck Lane estates, with the bodyshops between them.
Every Smethwick 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 Middlemore Industrial Estate plant to the single-bench Smethwick 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 Smethwick employers and others across West Midlands it is the record COSHH looks for first.
Grinding, weld-fume and machining extraction across the engineering and metal-rolling units, a trade rooted in the town's Black Country history, where metal dust and fume need capture at source.
Fume, dust and heat extraction across the foundry and springs units, where process fume needs capture proven.
Fume, vapour and dust extraction across the plastics and manufacturing lines, where process fume needs capture at source.
On-torch extraction, fume arms and downdraught benches across the Middlemore Industrial Estate and Roebuck 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 Smethwick 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 local college and the Midland Metropolitan University Hospital, to the containment their work demands.
On the ground in Smethwick
We are out under Smethwick's extraction every week. The proof that matters is the jobs, not a stock photo.
A metal-rolling and fabrication works in Smethwick had a weld-fume and grinding extraction bench pulling weak because the collector hopper below it had filled solid with fine metal dust. We emptied the hopper, checked the filter had recovered and measured the capture across the bench. It failed at first on the choked collector and passed once cleared, the extraction back at its design figure. Fine ferrous dust is a combustion risk in a full hopper, so the housekeeping was logged alongside the airflow.
The test
An HSG258 statutory LEV test goes well beyond a walk-round look. On a Smethwick system it has to establish three things - that the plant and ductwork are sound, that the hoods still capture, and that the capture still meets the figure the system was designed around.
Ductwork, hoods, filters, fans and dampers checked for damage, blockage and leakage across the Middlemore 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 Smethwick line.
Where exposure is in question - an engineering and metal-rolling process, say - sampling confirms whether control is actually protecting the people at the process.
The duty
COSHH Regulation 9 makes it plain: any LEV controlling exposure to a hazardous substance has to be thoroughly examined and tested at intervals no greater than fourteen months, and the resulting records kept for at least five years.
Across most Smethwick sites - the Middlemore Industrial Estate 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 Smethwick 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 Smethwick duty-holder.
Each system tagged with status and next-due date, so compliance is visible on the Roebuck 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. An engineering and metal-rolling bay, a foundry and springs work 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 Middlemore Industrial Estate units, term-time access at the Smethwick university labs, and normal hours at smaller workshops, so the examination never stops the line.
Engineering and metal-rolling, foundry and springs work, plastics and manufacturing, welding and fabrication, vehicle body and paint, and the labs of the college and hospital - the trades clustered around Middlemore Industrial Estate and Roebuck Lane and across the wider West Midlands.
Yes. A new spray booth or fume-arm install at a Smethwick 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 Middlemore 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.
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 Smethwick, but a Middlemore Industrial Estate fabrication shop and a Cape Hill 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 Middlemore Industrial Estate or a smaller Smethwick workshop needs for their COSHH file.
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