AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Ballyhornan: How It Happens and How to Prevent It
Pause reading for a moment when your diesel tank already has AdBlue in it: ignition off, motor off, and ring 0333 366 0103. Caught before your engine runs, it is generally a drain and a thorough flush, done where the car is in Ballyhornan. Here in advance? Then what follows explains how it happens and how to prevent it ever happening.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel car
Plenty of newer diesels in Killough, like those in Ballyhornan, run on two liquids; the engine takes only the diesel. The exhaust, not your motor, is where AdBlue ends up: dosed into the gas to clean it, from a separate tank.
Separate tanks, separate fillers. On a lot of motors the two sit side by side under the same flap; on others the AdBlue filler is in the boot or under the bonnet. Topping up the diesel side at the pump happens all the time. Rarely topped up, AdBlue normally goes in out of a bottle, poured by someone who must stop and think what filler it needs. That gap is where the slip lives.
AdBlue in the diesel tank around Ballyhornan: how it takes place
Three things tend to come together, and carelessness is seldom one of them.
To start with, the warning. Low AdBlue triggers a warning from the vehicle, and letting it run dry means limp mode — hence a rushed top-up, perhaps before work off B7041, perhaps at the pub in the village on the way home after work.
The old car's cap is where the hand goes — but a hire car, a new vehicle or a company car keeps the fillers elsewhere. That is a second thing: an unfamiliar motor.
And the bottle fits. A bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one, so nothing stops the tip after it has started. The same few seconds settle it, in the middle of Ballyhornan or out in Strangford.
The AdBlue filler and your diesel filler: telling them apart
Look at these first, at a forecourt in Ballyhornan or a driveway out in Downpatrick. A few seconds, no more.
- Check the cap rather than going by position: AdBlue caps are often blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel ones normally are not.
- The size. On many motors the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Many vehicles say there which fuel goes where.
- The handbook shows where it is if your filler is not next to the diesel cap: the boot, or under the bonnet.
- Check with the person who drove it last — before you leave, not when the light comes on — if you pick up a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park at the nearest station.
Keeping AdBlue out of the diesel tank when you top up
Anywhere around County Down the light comes on, this is a routine for that day.
- Turn off once parked — level ground, motor stopped, and not rushed beside B7065 at the roadside.
- Find the AdBlue filler, read the cap, and say the word "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds daft. It does the trick.
- The two under a single flap? Then confirm the cap on the diesel side stays shut before raising the bottle.
- Slowly is best, through the bottle's own spout, until it is full or the bottle runs out.
- Only after that, start the vehicle: close the cap, check again, and make sure your diesel cap was never opened.
If at step two or three you find you have already poured into the diesel side, stop there. Skip step five entirely.
Ballyhornan: already put AdBlue in the diesel tank?
Then the order of things is short. Do not start the engine. The fuel pump runs on many diesels as soon as the ignition is switched on — and so leave it off. Topping up with diesel won't thin it: instead, AdBlue drops to the bottom of your tank, right where the fuel is taken from.
On a forecourt — the nearest petrol station, another forecourt nearby or any other — the attendants will normally help roll the vehicle away, when you ask. On your own drive in Ballyhornan? Then the vehicle remains where it is.
If the motor has already run, stop as soon as it is safe and switch off. Leave the M77 — over 50 miles out of Ballyhornan — at the first exit. A short hop across Ballyhornan is a smaller job than a run towards Lisburn, under 25 miles away, and so tell us about how far it went.
Ballyhornan: what takes place when we turn up
By the local primary school, close to the centre or on your own driveway: wherever the car has stopped, our technicians come to it. Those answers determine the work and the price, so we ask what was put in, roughly how much, and whether it has run. You get that price on the phone, before anyone heads out.
Draining that tank comes next, followed by a full flush of the fuel system. Not like petrol, AdBlue leaves crystals and eats at some fuel-system metals, and none of that washes out unaided. That is why it matters more. The filter is flushed, or replaced where it needs to be; fresh diesel goes in; and your car is tested. Next our engineers start the engine and make sure it runs properly before leaving.
With pumps safe on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night, most jobs where your engine hasn't run need roughly half an hour after our technicians are there. You pay on the day, with nothing upfront, and get a VAT invoice and an engineer report for your insurer. While we travel, take a look at your insurance documents; plenty include cover for misfuelling.
About Ballyhornan itself
Ballyhornan is a small coastal locality in County Down, situated near the shores of the Irish Sea. Ballyhornan has a low elevation of around 3 metres, and its detached housing stock reflects its rural character. Ballyhornan is close to nearby places such as Strangford, Ardglass, and Portaferry, and is approximately 24 miles from the city of Lisburn.
Ballyhornan and County Down: AdBlue drains across the area
Ballyhornan is a coastal area, and the vans that cover it also work the places near it, Ardglass and Portaferry among them, across the BT postcode area. Quickest of all: give a BT30 7 postcode to the van.
The vehicle does not need to shift. The drain takes place right there, whether a driveway, a street near a street just off the centre, or a layby on the way to the green space at the edge of the village. Ring and ask rather than assuming if you are near a border, or somewhere hard to explain, like the back of the far end of the built-up part.
In short, for Ballyhornan drivers
Read the cap before you tip. AdBlue in your diesel tank after all? Leave it off and call 0333 366 0103; Petrol in Diesel empties it on the spot, throughout County Down.