Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Ballykelly
Motor off, ignition off: that is how you start if AdBlue has gone into the diesel tank. Water with urea dissolved in it: that is AdBlue. As it is water-based, it will not burn and won't blend with diesel; trouble just starts when the pump begins drawing it. If your engine hasn't run yet, AdBlue in a diesel tank is generally drained and carefully rinsed where the vehicle stands around Ballykelly. Ring 0333 366 0103 before you do anything else.
What to do straight away, Ballykelly: AdBlue in your diesel tank
To do:
- Keys out — then no one can power anything on.
- Close to moving traffic? So put your hazards on.
- The empty bottle or the receipt tells us the fluid and the quantity, so don't bin it away.
- Our van locates you fastest with a postcode starting BT49 9, or just the name of a street close by, and so call from the car.
Never:
- Shifting the car even a short way is no reason to start your engine.
- Many diesels run their fuel pump the moment the ignition goes on, so leave the vehicle off.
- AdBlue does not dilute in diesel — it separates out — so adding extra fuel will not weaken it.
- Any driving at all is best avoided, even a short distance along Crown Street.
- Beside the road, do not try draining it yourself.
Ask the people behind the counter to help you roll the vehicle away from the pumps if you're on a forecourt in Ballykelly, whether it's the the nearest petrol station or somewhere else. Parked on your own driveway? Then it remains exactly where it is.
AdBlue in a diesel tank: what it does
AdBlue is made for the exhaust, not your engine. From a separate reservoir it is fed directly to your exhaust, cleaning what the engine lets out. Neither side suits the other: urea does not belong in a pump, and a pump can't take urea.
Poured in with the diesel, it keeps apart rather than mixing — entirely unlike fuel. It drops, because it's denser than diesel, and pools low where the pickup draws its supply from. A motor topped up on a driveway in Artikelly yesterday evening and left unstarted counts as the straightforward case. Nothing has pulled the AdBlue up yet — but once the engine turns, that's what is pulled first, straight from the bottom of that tank.
Once it is pulled in, the harm takes two forms. What is left once the water evaporates is urea, which turns into crystals: they lodge in narrow channels and clog filters. Worse, it eats at certain metals in the fuel system, and carries on till it is cleared out. A motor left standing in Ballykelly with AdBlue already in its lines is worse by the morning; one with AdBlue just in its tank is not. Diesel lubricates the injection pump and every injector as it passes; water offers no lubrication, and that is a separate form of damage.
Why AdBlue in a diesel is regularly more serious than petrol
Petrol pumped into a diesel on another forecourt nearby's forecourt leaves the fuel thin — that's the whole fault. No damage is done as long as it stays put, blended into your diesel — only when the engine runs on it.
The issue with AdBlue in a diesel is a completely unsuitable liquid. Not burning, it cannot simply be run through. Crystals and corrosion remain through the following tankful, and AdBlue splits again from the diesel, and so thinning it won't work. That is why the flush counts more, and turning the key "to see" costs more with AdBlue than almost any other slip — in Glack or the centre of Ballykelly alike.
With AdBlue, the good news is no separate from petrol. If your engine hasn't run, the AdBlue is still inside your tank, and that tank is the easiest part of a fuel system to clear, wherever in County Londonderry your car is standing.
How does AdBlue end up in a diesel tank around Ballykelly?
Nobody means to do it. The AdBlue filler on many cars rests right next to your diesel filler, occasionally under the same flap, and the two caps can look alike in poor light. It usually occurs at home, from a container bought en route home, not at the filling station.
It tends to occur in a few familiar ways. The refill gets hurried outside the local primary school, because your dash flashed with a warning as the kids were taken off. Someone pours the container in outside their house, right off Crom Street, as the day ends. Otherwise, in dim light outside the pub in the village, your vehicle is refilled by a driver opening that flap for the first time.
Hired motors, new motors, company vehicles, or the spare vehicle in a home with one of each: the least familiar cars see it the most. Wherever you're in Ballykelly or the remainder of County Londonderry, it is the same mistake and the same first answer: leave the vehicle off.
Started the motor with AdBlue in your diesel tank around Ballykelly?
Then the AdBlue has left the tank. Your filter and lines have had it sucked along, and some running carries it on to the injection pump and each injector.
Rough running, smoke from the exhaust, lost power, dashboard lights or cutting out: any may show up, perhaps part way across Ballykelly or coming back from the green space at the edge of the village. Stop as soon as it is safe, switch off, and don't restart it to check. Each start pulls more of it through.
On the M77, over 50 miles from Ballykelly, the next junction is where to exit, and somewhere sensible is where to park — not carrying on.
A quick hop across Ballykelly to the car park by the centre is one thing; driving for Derry, under 15 miles away, is something else, since each mile pushes the AdBlue further in. So mileage counts. Approximately how far had it come? Tell us.
Our engineers do all of the flushing where the vehicle has ended up, and once the motor has been started there is more of it. Very seldom does it leave long-term damage when it is spotted quickly.
Ballykelly: how AdBlue is drained from a diesel
Wherever it has stopped in Ballykelly — a forecourt, a lay-by, a drive, a road beside a street just off the centre — the van comes to your car. Three replies shape the work, and so first we ask which fluid was put in, roughly what quantity, plus if the engine has run.
Right there, that tank is then emptied, and all of the polluted diesel and the urea come out as one. The fuel system is flushed thoroughly, which counts more with AdBlue than with petrol, because what it leaves behind doesn't rinse out on its own. Fresh diesel goes in once the filter is cleaned — or swapped, when it needs to be — and after that the car is tested. If your motor has not run, the majority of jobs take about half an hour once we are there. The pumps are explosion-proof, fine on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night.
The final step is to prime the fuel system on new diesel. Firing it up comes next, and then you drive off from where your car is parked, by the nearest station or on a drive in Ballykelly. The check before our engineers leave is that it runs smoothly on clean diesel. Because the job is done in its entirety where your car is, a garage never comes into it. At the end, there is the paperwork for your insurer: a VAT invoice plus a written report from the engineer.
About Ballykelly
Ballykelly is a coastal locality in County Londonderry, situated near the mouth of the River Roe and close to the cities of Derry and Limavady. Ballykelly sits at an elevation of 21 metres, looking out over the coastal landscape of Northern Ireland. Ballykelly is characterized by its semi-detached housing and small community of around 1030 residents. Ballykelly is located near several nearby places, including Drumraighland and Carrowclare.
AdBlue drains in Ballykelly and across County Londonderry
The vans that answer AdBlue jobs around Ballykelly also cover the locations round it, Drumraighland, Limavady and Carrowclare among them, and most of County Londonderry beyond, across the BT postcode area. Close to a boundary, or anywhere awkward to pin down? Asking beats guessing, so ring.
A van that comes to you suits Ballykelly, a coastal area: there's no need to bring your vehicle to us, since our engineers drain it there, in a drive, a residential street, a parking area or a forecourt.
What does AdBlue in a diesel tank cost to sort out around Ballykelly?
There's no honest single quote, since the jobs aren't the same. What shifts the price is, firstly, whether the engine has run and for how long; then how much AdBlue got in; and then where the vehicle is and whether a technician can get to it safely, which is easier on an open driveway than in a tight space behind the far end of the built-up part.
Which fluid got in, what quantity, and if the engine ran: every Ballykelly enquiry begins with precisely that, before any quote, not afterwards. Those answers narrow a range right down to a single number.
Quoted by phone before the van sets out, it is paid for that day — card or phone, nothing in advance. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it is worth checking yours whilst we are on the way.
Ballykelly: still beside your car?
Leaving the vehicle alone is, right now, the best move you can do. Ignition off, engine off, keys out. Ring 0333 366 0103 then tell us it's AdBlue, roughly how much, and if it has run. Petrol in Diesel takes it from there, around Ballykelly or anywhere across County Londonderry.