AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Black Green: How It Occurs and How to Prevent It
AdBlue already in your diesel tank? Then set this page down a moment, leave the ignition and motor off, then call 0333 366 0103. Caught before your engine runs, it is generally a drain and a thorough flush, done where the vehicle is in Black Green. Nothing happened yet? Further down, the rest of the page covers the reasons it happens and the ways to avoid it altogether.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel car
Not one liquid but two: that's how plenty of modern diesels around Black Green and Waterdale carry, with diesel feeding the engine. AdBlue's own tank holds it, and from there it is sent to the exhaust, and there a spray treats the gas.
Different tanks, separate fillers. Many of cars share a single flap for the two, while others put the AdBlue filler to your boot or under the bonnet. At the petrol pump, the diesel side is topped up constantly. A driver who has to stop and think where it goes usually fills the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and much less often. It's in that gap that the mistake happens.
AdBlue in your diesel tank in Black Green: how it occurs
Rarely is it carelessness: normally three things line up.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low your car tells you, and if it runs out completely, the car goes into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a drive off Meadow Close before work, or in the car park outside The Gate on the way home.
Unfamiliar motors come second, as well. Rentals, new cars and company cars put their fillers differently, and habit goes for the cap used on the old one.
And the bottle fits. A bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one, and so nothing stops the tip once it has started. Whether it happens in Bricket Wood or the middle of Black Green, it's the same few seconds.
Which filler is for AdBlue, and which for diesel?
Check these before pouring, on a forecourt around Black Green or a drive over in Old Bricket Wood. Seconds, that's all.
- Colour and lettering: an AdBlue cap is commonly blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap normally does not. Go by the cap, not its position.
- Plenty of cars fit AdBlue the smaller neck of the two.
- Look inside your fuel flap: plenty of cars have a label there saying which fuel goes where.
- The handbook. If the filler is not by your diesel cap, it's in your boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- Whoever had it before knows. Ask as you pick up a rental or fleet car — at Bricket Wood's car park, perhaps — rather than when the warning appears.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching your diesel tank
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever across Hertfordshire that is.
- Stop somewhere level, engine off, with time in hand — never hurried on the side of The Meads.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, once you find the AdBlue filler and reading it. Silly, yes, but it does the trick.
- The diesel cap stays on. When the two share a flap, confirm it is closed before the bottle comes up.
- Finish when that tank is topped up or the bottle is empty; before that, tip gently using its own spout.
- Before you start the vehicle, close the cap and check again that your diesel cap was never came off.
Discover at the second or third step that AdBlue went in the diesel filler? That is where you stop. Never go on to step five.
Black Green: already put AdBlue in the diesel tank?
What follows is a short order of things, beginning with not starting your motor. On many diesels the ignition alone runs the fuel pump, and so don't switch it on. Filling up with diesel won't thin it: instead, AdBlue sinks to the bottom of that tank, just where fuel is taken from.
If you're at a forecourt, whether it's the Harvest energy or the Shell, ask the attendants to help roll the car clear of the petrol pump. Your own driveway around Black Green is where it stays.
Already started? Pull over when it's safe, then turn off. On the M25, under a mile from Black Green, that means the next exit. Distance matters — a short hop across Black Green makes a smaller job than driving under 5 miles to St Albans — so tell us roughly how far it went.
Black Green: what occurs when we turn up
By Mount Pleasant Lane Primary School, near Saint Luke's Church, Bricket Wood or on your own driveway: wherever your car has stopped, we come to it. Our engineers ask what was put in, roughly how much, and whether it has run, since the replies settle the work and the quote. The price comes over the phone, ahead of any van leaving.
Emptying your tank comes next, then a thorough flush of the system. 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 counts more with AdBlue than with petrol. Testing is at the end: before that, clean diesel is added, and the filter is flushed or replaced if necessary. Your engine is fired up next and checked to confirm it runs correctly, all before our technicians head off.
Using pumps safe on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night, most jobs where the engine hasn't run take about half an hour after we arrive. You pay on the day, with nothing upfront, and get a VAT invoice and an engineer report for your insurer. Wrong-fuel cover is part of plenty of insurance policies — so make use of the wait to check yours.
About Black Green, briefly
Black Green is a suburban area in Hertfordshire, situated approximately 3 miles from St Albans and 17 miles from London. Black Green sits at an elevation of around 88 metres, in a gently undulating landscape of inland Eastern England. Black Green is characterised by its predominantly detached housing stock, with nearby places including Bricket Wood, Smug Oak, and How Wood.
AdBlue drains across Hertfordshire, Black Green included
Smug Oak and How Wood are among the towns around Black Green, a residential suburb, that the same teams cover, throughout AL postcodes. Fastest of all: give a AL2 3 postcode for our van.
The vehicle does not need to move. The drain takes place right there, whether a driveway, a road near St Stephen Parish Centre, or a layby on the way to Blackgreen Wood. If you are near a border, or somewhere hard to describe like the back of Hanstead House, ring and ask rather than guessing.
The short version for Black Green drivers
Before you pour, read the cap. AdBlue in your diesel tank regardless? Leave it switched off then phone 0333 366 0103; Petrol in Diesel empties it where it stands, across Hertfordshire.