Why It Happens and How to Prevent It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Bassingbourn
Leave your motor and ignition off and ring 0333 366 0103 now — reading can wait if AdBlue is already in the diesel tank. Normally, if the motor hasn't run, it's drained and thoroughly rinsed where your car sits in Bassingbourn. If you're reading before it has happened, the remainder of this page is about why it occurs and how to make sure it does not.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle, and its separate tank
Many newer diesels on the roads around Bassingbourn and Abington Pigotts carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to your engine. The exhaust, not your motor, is where AdBlue ends up: dosed into the gas to clean them, from its own tank.
Each tank has its own filler. Some vehicles keep the AdBlue filler in your boot or under the bonnet; a lot more have the two side by side behind one flap. At the petrol pump, your diesel side is topped up constantly. Seldom topped up, AdBlue normally goes in from a bottle, tipped by someone who must stop and think which filler it needs. The mistake grows in that gap between the two.
How AdBlue in your diesel tank takes place in Bassingbourn
Three things tend to come together, and carelessness is seldom one of them.
Hurry follows from the warning. Your car warns you as AdBlue runs low, and an empty tank sends the vehicle into limp mode — so the top-up gets done in a rush, before work on a drive off South End, or on the way home in the car park at The Belle.
The old car's cap is where the hand reaches — but a hire car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers elsewhere. That is a second factor: a new vehicle.
A spouted bottle meets no obstacle at a diesel filler any more than at an AdBlue one. And so the tip, once started, carries on. Whether it takes place in Kneesworth or the middle of Bassingbourn, it is the same few seconds.
Which filler is for AdBlue, and which for diesel?
Check these first, on a forecourt in Bassingbourn or a driveway out in Whaddon. A few seconds, no more.
- The cap. The AdBlue cap is often blue, or marked "AdBlue". The diesel cap normally is not. Read it instead of going by where it sits.
- The size. On many cars the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- Lift the flap and look for a label — many cars show what belongs in each filler right there.
- The handbook. If the filler isn't by the diesel cap, it's in the boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- The previous driver will know. Check when you collect a hire car or company car — at Royston's car park, say — not once the warning comes on.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach the diesel tank
The day the light goes on, wherever across Cambridgeshire, use this routine.
- Not in a rush on the side of Garden Place, not on a slope, not with the engine running: park then switch off properly.
- Locate the AdBlue filler, read the cap, and say the word "AdBlue" aloud as you unscrew it. It seems daft. It works.
- Leave the diesel cap on. If both sit under one flap, check your diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle.
- Gently is best, through the bottle's own spout, until it's full or the bottle runs out.
- Close the cap and check once more. Make sure the diesel cap was never opened. Only then start your car.
Find at the second or third step that the bottle went into the wrong filler? That's where you stop. Leave out stage five altogether.
Already put AdBlue in your diesel tank in Bassingbourn?
Don't start the engine: that's how the short order of things begins. Leave the ignition off too, because on plenty of diesels it by itself starts the pump. Do not top up with diesel to thin it: AdBlue does not mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of that tank, where your fuel is pulled from.
Ask the attendants to help roll the car clear of the pump if you are on a forecourt — the Tesco, the Esso or somewhere else. Your own drive in Bassingbourn is the place it stays.
Already started? Stop once it is sensible, then turn off. The next exit means the place to come off if you're on the A1(M), under 10 miles from Bassingbourn. About how far did it go? Crossing Bassingbourn is smaller a job than a run of under 15 miles towards Cambridge, so tell us.
Bassingbourn: what takes place when our engineers turn up
Anywhere the vehicle came to rest, be it outside Bassingbourn Primary School, near Bassingbourn United Reform Church or on your own drive, the van comes to it. Our engineers ask what got in, about how much, and if it's run, since the replies settle the work and our quote. During the call itself, you hear our quote — before dispatch.
The system is then cleaned thoroughly, after your tank is drained. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it does not wash out on its own — which is why the flush matters more here than with petrol. Filter flushed or, where it must be, swapped; fresh diesel in; and then a test of your car. Your engine is fired up next and tested to be sure it runs smoothly, all before our technicians leave.
Most jobs are done in roughly half an hour once our engineers arrive, as long as your engine hasn't run — and the pumps our technicians use are safe on a live forecourt yet quiet at night outside a house. Paying is on the day, not upfront, and you receive the documents your insurer wants: an engineer's report and a VAT invoice. While we travel, have a look at your insurance documents; plenty carry cover for misfuelling.
About Bassingbourn
Bassingbourn is a village in Cambridgeshire, situated in the eastern part of the county, approximately 11.6 miles from Cambridge. Bassingbourn sits in a low-lying area at an elevation of around 30 metres, near the villages of Kneesworth and Litlington. Bassingbourn has a population of around 1177 people, predominantly living in semi-detached housing. Bassingbourn is also within commuting distance of London, being about 39.5 miles from the capital.
Bassingbourn and Cambridgeshire: AdBlue drains across the area
Being a rural village, Bassingbourn shares its vans surrounding places — Litlington, Dyers Green — right across SG postcodes and the wider area around them. Fastest of all: quote a SG8 5 postcode to the van.
No need to move the car. Wherever it stands — beside St Peter and St Paul (Bassingbourn Parish Church), on a layby heading to Willmott Recreation Ground, on a drive — that's where it gets cleared. Tricky to explain, like the back of Bassingbourn Village Sign? By a border? Checking is better than guessing, and so phone.
In short, for Bassingbourn drivers
Tip nothing until you've read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank regardless, leave the car off and call 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel empties it where it stands, anywhere across Cambridgeshire.