Balmoral: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Prevent It?
Stop here a minute if the diesel tank already holds AdBlue in it: ignition off, motor off, then ring 0333 366 0103. A drain plus a thorough flush, done just where your car sits in Balmoral, is usually all it needs when found before your engine runs. The rest of this page explains why it takes place and how to ensure it does not — handy if you're reading before it has happened.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel car need its own filler?
Many current diesels on the roads around Balmoral and Old Town carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to the engine. AdBlue goes to your exhaust, where it is sprayed into the gas to clean it, and it lives in a tank of its own.
Different tanks, different fillers. Plenty of motors have a single flap for both, whereas others move the AdBlue filler to your boot or under the bonnet. Diesel gets filled at each filling station visit, week in, week out. Far less regularly, the AdBlue side is topped up — mostly from a bottle, by someone working out where it goes. That gap is where the error lives.
How AdBlue in your diesel tank takes place in Balmoral
Rarely is it carelessness: usually three things coincide.
First, the warning. Low AdBlue brings a warning from your car, and running out leads to limp mode — so a hurried top-up, maybe before work off Meigle Street, perhaps outside Hunters Hall on the way home after work.
The old car's cap is where the hand goes — yet a hire car, a new motor or a company car keeps the fillers somewhere else. That is a second factor: an unfamiliar motor.
No part stops the tip after it has started, because a bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as readily as an AdBlue one. The bottle fits. The same few seconds decide it, in the middle of Balmoral or out in Gala Park.
Which filler is for AdBlue, and which for diesel?
Check these first, on a forecourt in Balmoral or a driveway over in Glenfield. Seconds, no more.
- Check the cap instead of going by where it sits: AdBlue ones are regularly blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel caps usually aren't.
- Look at the size: the smaller neck is, on many vehicles, the AdBlue one.
- Look inside the fuel flap: many vehicles have a label there saying which fuel goes where.
- In your boot or under the bonnet: that is where the filler sits if it's not by the diesel cap, and the handbook tells you which.
- The person who drove the vehicle last. On a hire or company car picked up from somewhere like the car park outside Galashiels, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach your diesel tank
Wherever across Scottish Borders the light comes on, here is a routine for that day.
- Pull in on level, engine off, with time in hand — not hurried on the side of Forest Avenue.
- Silly as it sounds, speaking "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap does the trick — once you've found the filler and read the cap.
- Both under a single flap? Then make sure the lid on your diesel filler is still closed ahead of lifting the bottle.
- Finish once your tank fills or the bottle runs dry; before that, pour gently using its built-in spout.
- Before starting your car, close the cap and look again that your diesel cap never opened off.
Stop there if you find, at step two or three, that you've already poured into your diesel side. Don't go on to step five.
Balmoral: already put AdBlue in your diesel tank?
What follows is a short order of things, starting with no starting the engine. Leave the ignition off as well, because on many diesels it by itself starts the fuel pump. Filling up with diesel will not thin it: instead, AdBlue drops to the base of the tank, just where the fuel is taken from.
The attendants at Shell, Asda or another forecourt will normally help pushing your car clear when asked. At home around Balmoral? Then your car stays where it is.
If your engine has already run, stop as soon as it is safe and switch off. Leave the M8 — under 50 miles out of Balmoral — at the first junction. Tell us about how far it went: a run towards Edinburgh, under 50 miles away, is a bigger job than a short hop across Balmoral.
When our engineers arrive around Balmoral, what takes place?
Our van comes to the vehicle anywhere it has come to rest — your own driveway, near Great Tapestry of Scotland Visitor Centre, or by the local primary school. Both the work and our quote depend on three answers — which liquid, what amount, and if it's run — so we ask. Nobody heads out until you've had the price by phone.
Your system is then flushed thoroughly, after the tank is drained. With AdBlue that matters more than with petrol: it crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it doesn't wash out on its own. The filter is flushed, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and your car is tested. We don't leave until it has been started and is running properly.
Unstarted cars mostly need a half-hour visit after arrival. The equipment is fine on a live forecourt, and hushed enough for a driveway late at night. No money in advance; you settle up that day. Afterwards, the VAT invoice and the report from the engineer go to you for your insurer. Misfuelling cover is part of many insurance policies — and so make use of the wait to look at yours.
About Balmoral
Balmoral is a suburban area situated on the riverside in the Scottish Borders, with Gala Park and Galashiels nearby. Balmoral has a relatively low elevation of 142 metres and is located approximately 27 miles from Edinburgh. Balmoral is characterized by its predominant housing type, which is flats, and is home to around 4532 residents. Balmoral is also relatively distant from London, at around 304 miles away.
AdBlue drains around Balmoral, and Scottish Borders beyond
Being a residential suburb, Balmoral has the same vans as nearby places — Galashiels, Halliburton — all the way through TD postcodes and the wider area beyond. Give a postcode beginning TD1 1, and our van arrives quickest.
No need to move the car. Our engineers drain it where it is — a side street close to MacArts, a lay-by on the way to Gala Policies, a drive. Awkward to pin down, like the back of TK Maxx? Close to a county line? Checking is better than guessing, so ring.
The short version for Balmoral people
Read the cap before you tip. Even so AdBlue in your diesel tank? Petrol in Diesel can drain it where it is, anywhere in Scottish Borders: switch it off then ring 0333 366 0103.