How It Happens and How to Avoid It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Bollington Cross
Keep your motor and ignition off then ring 0333 366 0103 first — reading can wait when AdBlue is already in your diesel tank. Normally, when the engine hasn't run, it is drained and thoroughly cleaned where your vehicle is around Bollington Cross. Here before the event? Then the rest covers why it comes about and how to prevent it happening at all.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle: two tanks, two fillers
No single fluid but two: that is what plenty of newer diesels around Bollington Cross and Kerridge carry, with diesel feeding the engine. Stored in a tank of its own, AdBlue is fed into your exhaust gas to clean it.
Each tank has its own filler. On a lot of vehicles the two sit side by side under the same flap; on others the AdBlue filler is in the boot or under the bonnet. The diesel side is topped up at the pump all the time. Rarely filled, AdBlue normally comes out of a bottle, poured by a driver who must stop and think which filler to use. The mistake grows in that gap between the two.
How AdBlue in your diesel tank happens in Bollington Cross
Seldom is it carelessness: normally three things coincide.
Haste follows from the warning. Your car tells you as AdBlue runs low, and an empty tank puts it into limp mode — so the top-up gets done in a rush, before work on a drive off Kingsway, or on the way home in the car park at Springwood Park.
Then your car is unfamiliar. A hire car, a new motor or a company car puts the fillers where your last one did not, and your hand gets to for the cap it would have used on the old one.
Nothing halts the tip after it has started, since a bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one. The bottle fits. It's a few seconds, be it out in Lowerhouse or bang in the heart of Bollington Cross.
Which filler is for AdBlue, and which for diesel?
Be it a Bollington Cross forecourt or a driveway over in Tytherington, take a few seconds on these before anything goes in.
- The cap. The AdBlue cap is regularly blue, or marked "AdBlue". The diesel cap normally isn't. Read it rather than going by position.
- Plenty of motors give AdBlue the smaller filler of the two.
- A label inside the fuel flap often shows which fuel goes where, on many vehicles. Check for it.
- In the boot or under the bonnet: that is where your filler sits if it is 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 at Prestbury, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching your diesel tank
Anywhere in Cheshire the light comes on, here is a routine for that day.
- Not in a rush on the side of Bollington Road, not on a slope, not with your motor running: park and switch off first.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds silly and it does the trick.
- The diesel cap remains on. Where the two sit under a flap, make sure it's closed before the bottle comes up.
- Using the bottle's own spout, tip slowly — and stop when it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Close the cap, then check once more — confirm your diesel cap stayed shut the whole time. After that, start your car.
If at step two or three you find you have already poured into your diesel side, stop there. Don't go on to step five.
Put AdBlue in your diesel tank in Bollington Cross already?
The short order of things, starting with no starting the motor. Do not switch the ignition on; on many diesels that alone runs the fuel pump. Diluting it with extra diesel won't work, since AdBlue sinks to the bottom rather than mixing — and that's where your fuel is drawn from.
Ask the attendants to help push the vehicle clear of the pump if you are at a forecourt — the Shell, the Tesco or anywhere else. Leave it where it is if you are on your own driveway in Bollington Cross.
If the engine has already run, stop as soon as it is safe then switch off. The next exit is the place to come off when you're on the Roscoe's Spur, under 10 miles from Bollington Cross. About how far did it go? Crossing Bollington Cross is smaller work than a run of under 15 miles to Manchester, and so say.
What takes place when we arrive in Bollington Cross
By Bollington Cross CofE Primary School, near St Oswald or on your own drive: wherever your car has stopped, our engineers come to it. Those answers determine this work and our quote, and so we ask what got in, about how much, and if it has run. That quote is given over the phone, before any van leaves.
Draining your tank comes next, followed by a thorough flush of the fuel system. More than with petrol, it counts with AdBlue: crystals form, some metals are attacked, and none of that washes out on its own, no matter how long it is left. The filter cleaned or, if it must be, swapped; fresh diesel in; and then a test of your vehicle. Your engine is started next and tested to make sure it runs smoothly, all before our technicians leave.
Most jobs are finished in roughly half an hour once we get there, as long as the motor hasn't run — and the pumps we use are safe on a live forecourt and quiet after dark outside a house. You pay on the day, with nothing upfront, and get a VAT invoice and an engineer report for your insurer. Misfuelling cover is included in plenty of insurance policies — and so use the wait to check yours.
About Bollington Cross
Bollington Cross is a suburban area in Cheshire, situated inland at an elevation of 155 metres, with semi-detached housing being the predominant type of accommodation. Bollington Cross lies approximately 14 miles from Manchester, and its residents are around 149 miles from London. Bollington Cross is close to nearby places such as Lowerhouse, Bradley Mount, and Butley Town, and has a population of around 2203 people.
AdBlue drains across Cheshire, Bollington Cross included
Throughout SK postcodes, the teams covering Bollington Cross — a residential suburb — work the surrounding spots too, Butley Town and Bradley Mount included. Give a postcode that starts SK10 5, and the van gets there fastest.
There's no need to shift the car. Draining takes place on the spot, whether a drive, a street by Festival Labyrinth, or a lay-by towards Kerridge Sports Club. Guessing won't help behind Bollington Arts Centre, close to a boundary, or somewhere awkward to pin down; phone and check.
Bollington Cross motorists: the short version
Always, the cap; then, the pour. If AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank anyway, leave the car off then call 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel empties it where it waits, anywhere in Cheshire.