Preventing AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Blofield: Why It Happens
Pause reading for a moment when the diesel tank already holds AdBlue in it: ignition off, engine off, and call 0333 366 0103. Around Blofield, finding it before your motor runs normally means draining and a thorough flush where it stands. Reading in advance? Then what follows covers why it happens and what to prevent it happening at all.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel car
No single liquid but two: that is how plenty of modern diesels around Blofield and Hemblington carry, with diesel feeding the motor. Its own tank keeps it, and from there it is sent to the exhaust, and there spraying treats the gas.
There's a filler for every tank. Some cars put the AdBlue filler in your boot or under the bonnet; plenty more place the two side by side behind one flap. The diesel side is filled at the pump all the time. Seldom topped up, AdBlue usually comes from a bottle, tipped by a driver who has to stop and think which cap to use. It's in the gap that the error happens.
How AdBlue in the diesel tank takes place in Blofield
Seldom is it carelessness: usually three things coincide.
First, the warning. Low AdBlue brings a warning from the car, and letting it run out means limp mode — so a hurried top-up, maybe before work off The Street, perhaps at Kings Head on the way home after work.
Then, your hand reaches for the cap it knew on the old vehicle — because a rental car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't.
A spouted bottle finds no obstacle at a diesel filler no more than at an AdBlue one. So the pour, after begun, keeps on. Brundall or the middle of Blofield: it takes the same few seconds in both.
Which filler is for AdBlue, and which for diesel?
A couple of seconds is all the checks take — so run through them before you tip anything, on a drive in Blofield Corner or a forecourt around Blofield.
- Read the cap instead of going by position: AdBlue caps are regularly blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel ones usually aren't.
- Look at the size: the smaller filler neck is, on plenty of motors, the AdBlue one.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Plenty of cars say there which fuel goes where.
- In your boot or under the bonnet: that is where the filler is if it's not by your 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 at Brundall, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching your diesel tank
For the day the warning appears — wherever it is around Norfolk — a simple routine to follow.
- Stop somewhere level, motor off, with time in hand — not hurried on the side of Doctors Road.
- Silly as it sounds, speaking "AdBlue" aloud while you unscrew the cap works — after you have located the filler and read the cap.
- If both sit under one flap, check the diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — then leave the car on.
- Using the bottle's own spout, pour slowly — and stop when it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Close the cap and check once more. Make sure your diesel cap was never opened. Only then start the vehicle.
Stop there if you find, at step two or three, that you've already poured into the diesel side. Skip stage five altogether.
AdBlue in your diesel tank already, around Blofield?
Don't start your engine: that is where the short order of things begins. On many diesels the ignition alone runs the fuel pump, so don't switch it on. AdBlue doesn't mix with diesel — it sinks to the bottom of the tank, where your fuel is pulled from — so don't top up with diesel to thin it.
Ask the attendants to help push your car away from the pump if you are on a forecourt — the Shell, the Sainsbury's or anywhere else. Leave it where it is if you are on your own driveway in Blofield.
If the engine has already run, stop as soon as it is safe and switch off. On the M11, over 50 miles from Blofield, that means the next junction. Tell us about how far it went: a run towards Norwich, under 10 miles away, is a bigger job than a short hop across Blofield.
Our arrival around Blofield, and what occurs next
Wherever your car has stopped, be it outside Blofield Primary School, near Blofield Library or on your own drive, the van travels to it. What fluid went in, the quantity, and whether it ran: we ask because those replies decide both work and price. During the call itself, you hear our price — before dispatch.
Next: draining, then a full flush of the whole system. With AdBlue that counts more than with petrol: it crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it does not wash out on its own. The filter is flushed, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and the car is tested. We don't leave until it has been fired up and is running correctly.
Using pumps safe on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night, most jobs in which the motor hasn't run need roughly half an hour once we arrive. You pay on the day, with nothing upfront, and get a VAT invoice and an engineer report for your insurer. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it's worth checking yours whilst we're on the way.
About Blofield
Blofield is a village situated on the River Yare in Norfolk, with a mix of old and new properties, including many detached homes. Blofield sits at an elevation of 26 metres, close to the nearby settlements of Brundall and Hemblington Corner. Blofield is located near the city of Norwich, which is approximately 6.5 miles away, and is part of the wider Eastern region of England. Blofield has a population of around 2197 residents, living in a variety of housing types, predominantly detached homes.
Blofield and Norfolk: AdBlue drains across the area
Blofield is a village, and the teams that cover it also work the towns around it, Hemblington Corner and Blofield Heath among them, across the NR postcode area. Quote a postcode beginning NR13 4, and our van gets there fastest.
Shifting your car isn't needed. The drain happens right there, whether a driveway, a road by Margaret Harker Hall, or a lay-by towards Norfolk Premier Golf. Ring and ask instead of guessing if you are near a boundary, or somewhere hard to explain, like the back of 1st Blofield & Brundall Sea Scouts.
Blofield drivers: the short version
Pour no AdBlue till you've read the cap. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it stands, anywhere across Norfolk, if AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank anyway — so leave it off and call 0333 366 0103.