Telford · COSHH / HSG258
Statutory thorough examination and testing of local exhaust ventilation for Telford workshops and production sites, keeping fume and dust control compliant with COSHH and HSE guidance HSG258.
Telford
Telford is a manufacturing new town of more than 191,000 next to Ironbridge, the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution, and still one of the West Midlands' fastest-growing towns.
The work is advanced manufacturing - the automotive and appliance engineering, the plastics and injection moulding, and the food manufacturing - across the Hortonwood and Stafford Park estates, with the fabrication, bodyshops and distribution units between them.
Every one of those Telford processes puts fume, dust, mist or vapour into the air, and COSHH requires it controlled at source - which means local exhaust ventilation, thoroughly examined and tested at least every fourteen months. We test the LEV across all of it - from the Hortonwood units to the smaller Telford workshops - with capture and face-velocity readings, a clear pass or remedial outcome and system labelling.
By sector
Where fume, dust, mist or vapour is pulled away at the point it is made, that is LEV - and for employers in Telford and across Shropshire it stands as their COSHH evidence.
Machining, grinding, weld-fume and paint extraction on the automotive and appliance-engineering lines, where metal dust, mist and coating fume need capture at source.
VOC and particulate extraction on the plastics and moulding lines, where melt fume and dust need capture proven.
On-torch extraction, fume arms and downdraught benches across the Hortonwood and Stafford Park units. Since the HSE's 2019 reclassification, all welding fume - mild steel included - is treated as carcinogenic.
Spray-booth and prep-bay extraction at Telford bodyshops. Two-pack paints release isocyanates - the leading cause of occupational asthma - so booth airflow is examined to its design figure.
Flour-dust, steam and mist extraction across the food producers, where organic dust is a health and a combustion risk.
Fume-cupboard face-velocity testing for the Telford university campus and the Princess Royal Hospital, to the containment their work demands.
On the ground in Telford
We are out under Telford's extraction every week. The proof that matters is the jobs, not a stock photo.
A plastics recycling and pelletizing plant in Telford had a thermal extruder's exhaust hood losing capture velocity - the roof-fan drive belt was slipping. We got up onto the roof deck, measured the fan RPM, checked the belt tension and re-tested the hood face velocity. It passed conditionally once we tightened the belt, but we recommended a full belt replacement. The smell of melting polyolefins was strong enough to need carbon-lined respirators for the test.
The test
A statutory LEV test to HSG258 is far more than a look round. On a Telford 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 Hortonwood 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 Telford line.
Where exposure is in question - an automotive and advanced engineering 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.
On most Telford sites - the Hortonwood units and the smaller workshops alike - it is the fourteen-month clock that bites: let it lapse and the system is non-compliant that day, however well it seems to run. We examine it, tag each hood with its status and next-due date, and hand over the report an HSE inspector or insurer will want. Where something fails you get the reading, the cause and the remedy - never just a red sticker.
How it runs
Full visual and structural check of every hood, duct run, filter and fan across the Telford 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 Telford duty-holder.
Each system tagged with status and next-due date, so compliance is visible on the Stafford 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. An automotive and advanced engineering bay, a plastics and injection moulding bench and a lab fume cupboard can each sit on a different interval - we set the right one for every system.
Automotive and advanced engineering, plastics and injection moulding, welding and fabrication, vehicle body and paint, food manufacturing, and the labs of the university campus and hospital - the trades clustered around Hortonwood and Stafford Park and across the wider Shropshire.
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 Hortonwood or a smaller Telford workshop needs for their COSHH file.
Yes. A new spray booth or fume-arm install at a Telford 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 Hortonwood units, term-time access at the Telford 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 Hortonwood 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 Telford, but a Hortonwood fabrication shop and a Wellington canopy are kept as the separate jobs they are.
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