Thornaby-on-Tees · COSHH / HSG258
Statutory thorough examination and testing of local exhaust ventilation for Thornaby-on-Tees workshops and production sites, keeping fume and dust control compliant with COSHH and HSE guidance HSG258.
Thornaby-on-Tees
Thornaby-on-Tees stands on the south bank of the River Tees within the borough of Stockton-on-Tees, home to around twenty-five thousand people, and a town whose skyline the RAF once owned - its aerodrome opened in 1929 and flew Coastal Command patrols through the war, and a full-size Spitfire replica still guards the Trenchard Avenue roundabout as its memorial.
Its working economy runs on precision engineering, process and the fabrication trades, much of it grouped in the units of the Teesside Industrial Estate and the Teesdale Business Park raised on the old Head Wrightson site.
Wherever a Thornaby-on-Tees process releases fume, dust, mist or vapour, COSHH puts the duty on you to control it at source, and the extraction that does so is LEV - subject to a thorough examination and test at least every fourteen months. We work across the range, from the Teesside Industrial Estate units down to the smallest Thornaby-on-Tees workshop, measuring capture and face velocity and issuing a plain pass-or-remedial result with every hood tagged.
By sector
If a process captures fume, dust, mist or vapour at source, that capture system is LEV - and across Thornaby-on-Tees and the wider County Durham it is your evidence under COSHH.
Oil-mist and coolant-mist extraction on CNC machining centres, from the Head Wrightson heavy-engineering heritage to the precision and process shops on the Teesside Industrial Estate around Perry Avenue.
Steam canopies and flour-dust control in the bakeries and food plants that carry on the trade of Thornaby's old Cleveland Flour Mill and the wider Teesside food industry.
Fine-dust extraction and downdraught tables at the joinery and furniture works on the Teesside Industrial Estate, such as Decorative Panels Furniture and the Howdens Joinery operation, 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 Teesside Industrial Estate units and the heavy-lifting and process yards, home to firms like the crane and heavy-lift specialist Mammoet. Since the HSE's 2019 reclassification, all welding fume - mild steel included - is treated as carcinogenic.
Spray-booth and prep-bay extraction at Thornaby 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 process laboratories, the NETA training centre and the healthcare sites around Thornaby, to the containment their work demands.
On the ground in Thornaby-on-Tees
We are out under Thornaby-on-Tees's extraction every week. The proof that matters is the jobs, not a stock photo.
At a busy dental laboratory in Thornaby-on-Tees the extraction over the polishing station had stopped pulling as it should, which we traced to a leaking flexible connection. We measured face and capture velocities, ran smoke tests at each point and looked over the fan and filter before putting anything right. Once a slipping belt was sorted every point passed on re-test, and the lab held a valid thorough examination and test certificate again. We slotted the work into a quiet bank holiday so the technician's own day wasn't interrupted.
The test
Under HSG258 a statutory LEV test is no visual once-over. For a Thornaby-on-Tees system it has to answer three things - whether the system is sound, whether it still draws at the hood, and whether that draw holds to what it was designed to deliver.
Ductwork, hoods, filters, fans and dampers checked for damage, blockage and leakage across the Teesside 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 Thornaby-on-Tees 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 the great majority of Thornaby-on-Tees sites, from the Teesside Industrial Estate units to the one-man workshops, the fourteen-month deadline is what catches people out: once it passes the system is non-compliant regardless of its actual state. We carry out the examination, label every hood with its status and next-due date, and issue the report an HSE inspector or your insurer expects to see - and if a point fails, you get the number, the cause and the fix rather than a bare fail.
How it runs
Full visual and structural check of every hood, duct run, filter and fan across the Thornaby-on-Tees 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 Thornaby-on-Tees duty-holder.
Each system tagged with status and next-due date, so compliance is visible on the Teesdale Business 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.
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 Teesside Industrial Estate or a smaller Thornaby-on-Tees workshop needs for their COSHH file.
precision engineering and manufacturing, food and drink production, woodworking and joinery, welding and fabrication, vehicle body and paint, and laboratory fume cupboards - the trades clustered around Teesside Industrial Estate and Teesdale Business Park and across the wider County Durham.
Yes - the industrial estates and workshops around Teesside Industrial Estate and Teesdale Business Park, the university and hospital labs, and the wider County Durham.
Yes. We plan testing around production shifts at the Teesside Industrial Estate units, term-time access at the Thornaby-on-Tees university labs, and normal hours at smaller workshops, so the examination never stops the line.
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 Teesside Industrial Estate unit will ask to see.
Yes. A new spray booth or fume-arm install at a Thornaby-on-Tees 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.
Local knowledge
Head Wrightson began on the Thornaby marshes in 1840 as the Teesdale Iron Works, and grew into a heavy-engineering giant that at its 1960s peak employed more than six thousand people, building bridges, boilers and railway ironwork shipped around the world. When the works finally closed in 1987 the site north of the town hall became the Teesdale Business Park, but that precision-engineering instinct still runs through Thornaby's machine shops and process suppliers. Every one of them carries 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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