Birks: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Prevent It?
Keep the engine and ignition off then call 0333 366 0103 first — the rest can wait when AdBlue is already in the diesel tank. A drain plus a thorough flush, carried out just where your vehicle sits in Birks, is usually what it takes if caught before the engine runs. The remainder of this page covers why it occurs and how to make sure it doesn't — useful if you're reading ahead of time.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel motor need its own filler?
Diesel goes to your motor — but plenty of current diesels driven around Birks and Fairweather Green carry another fluid as well. AdBlue goes to your exhaust, where it is sprayed into the gas to fresh it, and it lives in a tank of its own.
Separate tanks, different fillers. Other vehicles keep the AdBlue filler in the boot or under the bonnet; plenty more have both together under one flap. Diesel gets filled on each forecourt call-out, again and again. The AdBlue side is topped up far less commonly, usually from a bottle, and normally by someone who has to stop and think where it goes. The mistake grows in the gap between them.
How does AdBlue in the diesel tank occur in Birks?
Carelessness seldom explains it. What does is three things coming up at once.
Haste follows from the warning. The car warns you as AdBlue runs low, and a dry tank sends it into limp mode — so the top-up gets done quickly, before work on a drive off Glenlee Road, or on the way home in the car park outside Red Lion.
The old car's cap is where your hand reaches — yet a rental car, a new vehicle or a company car keeps the fillers elsewhere. That is a second thing: a new motor.
Third, the spout goes in: diesel filler or AdBlue filler, it goes in just as readily, and after the tip begins, nothing stops it. The same few seconds decide it, in the middle of Birks or out in Green Side.
Telling the AdBlue filler from the diesel filler
Check these first, at a forecourt in Birks or a driveway over in Brown Royd. A few seconds, that's all.
- The cap. The AdBlue cap is often blue, or marked "AdBlue". The diesel cap usually isn't. Read it rather than going by position.
- Many cars fit AdBlue the smaller filler of the two.
- Check inside the fuel flap: plenty of cars have a label there showing which fuel goes where.
- In the boot or under the bonnet: that is where the filler sits if it's not by your diesel cap, and the handbook says which.
- Check with the person who drove it last — before you leave, not when the light comes on — when you pick up a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park outside Bradford Forster Square.
Keeping AdBlue out of the diesel tank when you top up
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever across West Yorkshire that is.
- Pull in on level, motor off, with time in hand — not hurried on the side of Rhylstone Mount.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, once you find the AdBlue filler and reading it. Daft, perhaps, but it works.
- The diesel cap stays on. When both share a flap, make sure it's shut before lifting the bottle.
- Using the bottle's own spout, tip slowly — and stop when it is full or the bottle is empty.
- Only then, start the car: close the cap, check a second time, and make sure your diesel cap was never opened.
Discover during the second or third step that AdBlue went into the wrong tank? That's where you stop. Never go on to stage five.
Put AdBlue in your diesel tank around Birks already?
Then the order of things is short. Do not start your engine. The fuel pump starts on plenty of diesels as soon as your ignition is switched on — so leave it off. Filling up with diesel will not thin it: instead, AdBlue drops to the base of your tank, just where the fuel is taken from.
On a forecourt — Asda, YAS or another — the staff will usually help push the car away, if you ask. If you're on your own driveway in Birks, leave it where it is.
Where your motor has been run already, stop somewhere safe and switch the vehicle off. On the M606, under 3 miles from Birks, that means the next junction. Distance matters — a quick hop across Birks makes a smaller job than heading under 3 miles towards Bradford — so say roughly how far it went.
Our arrival around Birks, and what takes place next
By Lidget Green Primary School, close to 5-Alive Indoor Soccer or on your own drive: wherever the vehicle has stopped, our technicians come to it. The replies determine the work and the price, so our engineers ask what got in, about how much, and if it has run. On the phone call itself, you are told our quote — before dispatch.
Emptying your tank comes next, then a full flush of your system. Not like petrol, AdBlue forms crystals and eats at certain fuel-system metals, and neither clears out unaided. Hence it matters more. Testing comes last: before that, clean diesel is added, and your filter is flushed or changed if necessary. We don't leave until it has been fired up and is running properly.
Using pumps safe on a working forecourt and quiet enough for use outside a house at night, most jobs in which the engine hasn't run take roughly half an hour after our engineers arrive. Paying happens on the day, not upfront, and you receive the paperwork an insurer asks for: an engineer's report and a VAT invoice. Misfuelling cover is included in plenty of insurance policies — and so use the wait to check yours.
About Birks, briefly
Birks is a suburban area located on the outskirts of Bradford in West Yorkshire, sitting alongside the river at an elevation of around 138 metres. Birks is characterized by its predominantly terraced housing stock, reflecting the typical architectural style of many northern English towns. Birks is close to nearby places such as Green Side, Four Lane Ends, and Lidget Green, and is situated approximately 1.5 miles from Bradford city centre. Birks has a population of around 5715 people, according to recent estimates.
AdBlue drains around Birks and across West Yorkshire
Four Lane Ends and Lidget Green are among the places near Birks, a residential suburb, that the same teams cover, over BD postcodes. A postcode starting BD7 2 gets the van to you fastest.
The car remains put. Our engineers drain it where it is — a side street near St William's Catholic Church, a lay-by on the way to West Park, a drive. Guessing doesn't help behind Tabligh-ul-Islam Mosque, close to a border, or somewhere awkward to pin down; phone and ask.
For Birks people, the short version
Before you pour, read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank regardless, leave the car off then ring 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel clears it where it sits, anywhere around West Yorkshire.