Wellingborough · COSHH / HSG258
Statutory thorough examination and testing of local exhaust ventilation for Wellingborough workshops and production sites, keeping fume and dust control compliant with COSHH and HSE guidance HSG258.
Wellingborough
Wellingborough is a Northamptonshire town of around 56,000 on the River Nene, built on the boot-and-shoe trade and now a golden-triangle logistics hub with the Whitworths milling heritage.
The work is logistics and manufacturing - the golden-triangle distribution, the footwear and leather trades, and the food and drink manufacturing - across the Denington Industrial Estate and Park Farm estates, with the bodyshops between them.
Every one of those Wellingborough 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 Denington Industrial Estate units to the smaller Wellingborough workshops - with capture and face-velocity readings, a clear pass or remedial outcome and system labelling.
By sector
If a process captures fume, dust, mist or vapour at source, that capture system is LEV - and across Wellingborough and the wider Northamptonshire it is your evidence under COSHH.
Battery-charging, weld-fume and paint extraction across the golden-triangle distribution parks off the A45 and A509, where the maintenance and fabrication bays need capture at source.
Adhesive-vapour, solvent and dust extraction across the footwear and leather units, a trade rooted in the town's boot-and-shoe heritage, where solvent vapour and dust need capture proven.
Steam, dust and mist extraction across the food and drink producers, where organic dust is both a health and a combustion risk.
On-torch extraction, fume arms and downdraught benches across the Denington Industrial Estate and Park Farm units. Since the HSE's 2019 reclassification, all welding fume - mild steel included - is treated as carcinogenic.
Spray-booth and prep-bay extraction at Wellingborough 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 Tresham College and Isebrook Hospital, to the containment their work demands.
On the ground in Wellingborough
We are out under Wellingborough's extraction every week. The proof that matters is the jobs, not a stock photo.
A footwear factory in Wellingborough had a solvent-vapour extraction over an adhesive and sole-bonding bench running weak because a branch damper had dropped shut. We freed the damper, re-ran the capture check at the bench and measured the branch flow. It failed at first on the low capture from the closed damper and passed once it was reset, the adhesive vapour drawn cleanly off the line. The bench used solvent-based cements, so vapour monitoring backed up the airflow test.
The test
An HSG258 statutory LEV test goes well beyond a walk-round look. On a Wellingborough 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 Denington 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 Wellingborough line.
Where exposure is in question - a logistics and distribution process, say - sampling confirms whether control is actually protecting the people at the process.
The duty
Under Regulation 9 of COSHH the obligation sits squarely with the employer - any LEV that controls a hazardous substance needs a thorough examination and test at least every fourteen months, and the records held for five years.
On most Wellingborough sites - the Denington Industrial Estate 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 Wellingborough 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 Wellingborough duty-holder.
Each system tagged with status and next-due date, so compliance is visible on the Park Farm Industrial Estate 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 logistics and distribution bay, a footwear and leather bench and a lab fume cupboard can each sit on a different interval - we set the right one for every system.
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 Wellingborough, but a Denington Industrial Estate fabrication shop and a Market Street 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 Denington Industrial Estate or a smaller Wellingborough workshop needs for their COSHH file.
Yes. We plan testing around production shifts at the Denington Industrial Estate units, term-time access at the Wellingborough university labs, and normal hours at smaller workshops, so the examination never stops the line.
Yes - the industrial estates and workshops around Denington Industrial Estate and Park Farm Industrial Estate, the university and hospital labs, and the wider Northamptonshire.
Yes. A new spray booth or fume-arm install at a Wellingborough 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 Denington 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.
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