How It Occurs and How to Prevent It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Aylesham
AdBlue already in your diesel tank? Then set this page down for now, keep the ignition and motor off, then ring 0333 366 0103. Normally, when your engine hasn't turned, it is emptied and fully rinsed where the vehicle sits around Aylesham. Reading in advance? In that case the rest covers why it happens and what to prevent it happening at all.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle, and its separate tank
Many newer diesels on the roads about Aylesham and Adisham carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to your motor. Stored in a tank of its own, AdBlue is sprayed into the exhaust gas to clean it.
Separate tanks, separate fillers. Many of vehicles share a single flap for the two, whereas others put the AdBlue filler to the boot or under the bonnet. Diesel gets filled at each forecourt visit, again and again. Far less often, the AdBlue side gets topped up — normally from a bottle, by someone thinking about where it goes. That gap is where the error lives.
Aylesham: how AdBlue in the diesel tank happens
It's rarely carelessness. Three things tend to line up.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low the vehicle tells you, and if it runs out completely, the car goes into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a drive off Market Place before work, or in the car park at the pub in the village on the way home.
The old car's filler is where the hand goes — yet a rental car, a new vehicle or a company car keeps the fillers somewhere else. That is a second thing: an unfamiliar vehicle.
And the bottle fits. A bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one, so nothing stops the pour after it has started. Whether it happens in Snowdown or the middle of Aylesham, it's the same few seconds.
The AdBlue filler and your diesel filler: telling them apart
Be it a Aylesham forecourt or a driveway out in Bloodden, take a couple of seconds over these before anything is poured in.
- Where it sits can mislead; the cap does not. AdBlue caps are often blue or bear the word "AdBlue" — diesel caps usually do not.
- Look at the size: the smaller filler neck is, on plenty of motors, the AdBlue one.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Many cars say there which fuel goes where.
- Can't see it beside the diesel inlet? Then check below the bonnet or in your boot — the handbook says where.
- Whoever had it before knows. Ask as you pick up a hire car or fleet car — from the nearest station's car park, perhaps — not when the light appears.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach the diesel tank
When the light comes on, wherever in Kent, use this routine.
- Park then switch off. Not on a slope, not with the engine running, and not in a rush on the side of Market View.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds silly and it does the trick.
- The diesel cap remains on. When both sit under a flap, confirm it is closed before lifting the bottle.
- Finish when your tank is topped up or the bottle runs dry; before that, tip slowly using its own spout.
- Shut the cap, then look once more — making sure the diesel filler stayed shut the whole time. After that, start the vehicle.
If at stage two or three you find you have already poured into the diesel side, stop there. Never go on to stage five.
AdBlue in the diesel tank already, around Aylesham?
Don't start your motor: that's where the short order of things starts. On many diesels your ignition alone runs the fuel pump, so do not switch the car on. Diluting it with extra diesel fails, because AdBlue sinks to the base rather than blending — and that's where the fuel is sucked from.
Ask the staff to help roll the vehicle away from the pump if you're at a forecourt — the Pace, the Shell or somewhere else. At home in Aylesham? So the car stays put.
Stop as soon as it is safe and switch off, if the motor has already run. Aylesham sits under 10 miles from the M20; on it, take the first junction. A short hop across Aylesham is a smaller job than a run towards Canterbury, under 10 miles away, and so tell us about how far it went.
What takes place when our engineers get there in Aylesham
Wherever the car came to rest, be it by Aylesham Primary School, near Aylesham Heritage Memorial or on your own drive, the van travels to it. The answers settle the work and the price, and so our engineers ask what went in, roughly how much, and whether it has run. During the phone call itself, you hear the price — before dispatch.
The fuel system is then cleaned thoroughly, after that tank is emptied. More than with petrol, it matters with AdBlue: the crystals build up, certain metals corrode, and none of that washes away on its own, however long it sits. Once the fuel filter is cleaned — or replaced, where needed — clean diesel goes in, and then your vehicle gets tested. We don't leave until it has been started and is running smoothly.
If your motor hasn't run, most jobs take about half an hour once we are there, using pumps that are fine on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night. Payment happens on the day, not upfront, and you receive the documents your insurer asks for: an engineer report and a VAT invoice. It's worth checking your policy while we travel to you: misfuelling cover comes with plenty of policies.
About Aylesham and where it is
Aylesham is a village in Kent, situated approximately 6.5 miles from Canterbury and 60.5 miles from London, at an elevation of around 77 metres. Aylesham sits in a rural area surrounded by nearby places such as Snowdown, Ratling, and Nonington. Aylesham has a population of around 3297 people, predominantly living in semi-detached housing. Aylesham remains a residential community with a mix of local amenities and rural surroundings.
Aylesham and Kent: AdBlue drains across the area
Being a rural village, Aylesham shares its vans nearby areas — Ratling, Nonington — right through CT postcodes and the wider area around them. Quote a postcode beginning CT3 3, and our van gets there fastest.
The car stays put. Our technicians drain it where it is — a side street near First and Second World War Memorial, a lay-by on the way to Village Green, a drive. If you are close to a border, or somewhere hard to explain like the back of St Peter, ring and ask instead of assuming.
For Aylesham people, the short version
Before you pour, read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank all the same, leave the car off and phone 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel clears it where it stands, anywhere around Kent.