Posted By Al Beevers Hi, A concern has been raised about getting our microwave ovens tested for microwave leakage. They are all domestic models, and are PAT tested yearly. Does anyone have any info. about leakage testing. How often? Relevent regs? All and any help would be appreciated. Al.

Posted By fats van den raad Al I cannot recall any specific regs either (other than Management regs) but I do know it is considered good practise to check for leakage on regular basis(even monthly) Checks are simple and easy and equipment relatively cheap. Can be bought from places like RS. Any person with a bit of technical knowledge (such as electrician)should be able to use it.

Posted By Keith32 Must admit, while you can measure for mircowave leakage, I have always thought that this is a bit of a red herring in terms of risk. Provided the oven is in reasonable condition - door seals efective, door interlocks effective, then leakage is minimal and of no significance. I mean do you ever measure the leakage on your domestic microwave or TV or PC? Although clearly a microwave oven is deisgned to generate microwaves whereas PC/TVs produce them as a side effect. Of course we could get into the telephone mast debate as well.

Posted By John Murgatroyd Well, we're not into the mobile problem...but m/wave oven leakage is worse. It is highly unlikely to harm you, but an oven with a door seal broken, or just dirty, can leak tens of watts of m/waves....the most threatened body part is the eye. Work it out.

Posted By Nigel Singleton BSc Small hand held testers are available at very little cost. Simple job run it around the seal and check for yourself. If it is leaking change it, they are cheap enough these days.

Posted By Kate Graham If you can't afford to get the microwave tested for leaks then your firm is in a pretty bad financial state so no thanks, I don't want to swap.

Posted By John Donaldson We have several hundred microwave ovens in the most aggressive environment you could imagine. Student Kitchens!!!. We test them each year as part of our PAT cycle and have yet to find one which does leak. The only exceptions to this is when the seals have been damaged or the door has been deliberately tamped with. I would suggest that in most cases a simple visual inspection would suffice. If it was not for the need to PAT test we would have stopped testing for leakage some time ago.

Posted By John Murgatroyd As long as the door interlocks have not been either damaged, or deliberately jammed in the "use" position (I have seen this, on a cooker that the latches had broken off), then the cooker is as safe as anything else. However, since the microwave energy is at a frequency of 2400 mhz (+-) and at an rf voltage in excess of 1000 volts, you could feasibly get a nasty shock from a metal implement held close to a leaky seal. RF burns are small, deep and take a long time to heal.

Posted By Kate Graham How about "proportionate"? If the risk is fairly small but is simple to put right (after either a visual inspection of the seal or waving a gadget in front), why NOT fix it? It doesn't involve a lot of paperwork or effort, just seeing if a seal is faulty and replacing it.

Posted By Roger the Dodger Well said Shane. I thought the Radiation Protection regs were for ionising radiation - microwaves are non-ionising, or have I missed a complete set of regs?

Posted By John Donaldson Roger is correct, The Radiation Regulations which were mentioned earlier, (Ionising Radiation Regulations 1999) as the tile implies only cover Ionising Radiation not Non Ionising Radiation as would be emitted by a microwave oven. There are no specific regulations covering Non Ionising Radiation only advice issued by NRPB. But this will change as the Physical Agents Directive progresses. Certainly microwave ovens used in the workplace would be covered by PUWER and large industrial unit should of course be subject to rigorous leak testing. I would challenge the “ It only takes one minute” I have several hundred of them scattered over a 250 acre campus I wish it only took just over 3 hours to do them all. We would not do it if we were not already doing PAT testing. As someone said it is about proportionatalty. In case someone points out that Students micro wave ovens are not work euipoment they are covered under Consumer Protection legistlation which requires that portable appliances in leased proerties are PAT tested each year. I have to say we would do that in any case.

Posted By Jeff This is another of those threads that goes on for ever about an insignificant risk. Some time ago there was one about earthquakes and emergency procedures - about the same category wouldn't you think. This risk is minimal with in one client case just one incident out of 70 ovens - cured by wiping the seal. So the action is regularly wipe the seals in the normal cleaning regime and if the door or seal is damaged replace the microwave - currently from about £20 at Curry's or similar. To the person who said if the company can't afford to check the ovens it is a poor company - I would say 'what is the point of wasting time and other resources on low risk items such as this when it would be better spent on the higher priority activities'. And wouldn't it be better to learn from others experiences and act on them rather than test everything in sight. With respect it is this overreacton to minor risks which give H&S such a bad name and we would all benefit if some of us could open our minds to some common sense. Jeff

Posted By Paul Crump Al The reason you have asked the question is because of a concern that has been raised within your workplace? Could you provide more detail on this point? Who raised the concern? Are they an employee who has to use the equipment? Are they male or female? If the person is female is she a new or expectant mother? This may or may not be relevant as to the concern. We test our microwaves every six months for leakage. The equipment is then issued with a test certificate. If the equipment fails the test it is repaired and tested again to ensure the repair is successful. Although microwave leakage may not be a significant risk it is covered by a standard. So I suppose it’s up to you if you want to achieve the standard or dismiss it as being insignificant. Cheers

Posted By Jeff Thanks for the support Shane/Artful but you can see to some we are just p****** in the wind. Now that is a significant risk and perhaps worthy of our attention. Jeff

Posted By Jeff I'd interested in answers to the following from any of those who spend valuable resources on testing microwave ovens: 1. How many microwave ovens do you have. 2, How much does the testing cost - external & internal costs should be included 3. Do you have a seal cleaning regime in place 4. How many ovens per annum are defective in terms of radiation 5. How much are your repair costs per annum 6. What is the risk rating of an oven with a defective seal taking into account that the radiation strength is inversley proportional to distance ie 1/d 7. Accident /ill health figures of people affected by microwave ovens at your work place From those figures we would be able reach an educated conclusion as to whether or not it is worth continuing the testing regime. It would also help some others like myself who are struggling with the this concept of putting valuable resources into additional, but unnecessary, control measures into insignificant risks. Jeff

Posted By Jeff Hi John - I don't want to go off the subject but I missed this the first time round. ''In case someone points out that Students micro wave ovens are not work euipoment they are covered under Consumer Protection legistlation which requires that portable appliances in leased proerties are PAT tested each year. I have to say we would do that in any case.'' Could you provide a reference for the above legislation - I'd no idea there was a specific legal requirement to test in any legislation. Jeff

Posted By John Murgatroyd I'm with Jeff. Why bother. The ill-effects are likely to be long term anyway. As for the decrease in radiation being inversely proportional to the distance (double the distance quarter the power) you also have an exposure level to consider. I think it's 10mw per square centimetre.

Posted By John Murgatroyd Good idea. Check this: http://www.mercola.com/a...le/microwave/hazards.htm And this: http://www.relfe.com/microwave.html Mind you, they may be prejudiced. In any case, who cares ? As I said, it'll be years before any damage shows, so what the heck ! Oh, and a maintenance manual for a commercial microwave oven states that if microwave energy is found outside the oven at a power greater than 1mw/cm2 it is necessary to take the oven out of service and repair it.

Posted By Jack I'm a bit surprised, too, that we're having this discussion in 2004. Back in the early 80's I worked for a large organisation with lots of these. There was a scheme in place to check them but we took the decision to discontinue on the basis of a risk assessment (but I suspect we called it something else then) putting the emphasis on ensuring the seals were kept clean as has been suggested above. Sometime in the 80's the HSE had one of their 'Guidance Notes' (the PM or GS series?) which actually said that testing was unnecessary (and also that the cheap testers being produced at that time were worse than useless - unlike the pucker calibrated ones). John, I'm not quite sure what you are getting at re your comments on 'H&S is mainly concerned with short term effects'. Is that your view of what the role of h&s practitioner is about; a comment on your own organisation; or a comment on our ethics? The reference to 'not on my shift' would suggest either of the latter 2. If it's about your own organisation - and you have in the past written about it's shortcomings - have you considered moving somewhere you could make a difference? If the latter, I wonder how much contact you have with your peers? Indeed many discussions on this forum are about long term effects (some of which you have - correctly in my view - debunked). Do you think that if evidence is shown of long term effects of, say, a particular substance, that h&s advisers would not then set about doing something to address it? Of course, the decision to take action would rest with management but most of us realise that part of our role, and it should be one of our competencies, is to persuade management.

Posted By John Murgatroyd Maybe I should have added: "or am I an employee of a company whose H&S consultancy has advised them that measures to control their dust problem are not needed given the expected remaining life of the company" Good old H&S professionals, they'll kill you every time. Good career though.