Bow Street: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Avoid It?
Leave the motor and ignition off then ring 0333 366 0103 now — reading can wait if AdBlue is already in your diesel tank. Around Bow Street, catching it before the engine turns usually means draining and a thorough flush where it stands. Here in advance? In that case what follows explains how it happens and how to stop it happening at all.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel car need its own filler?
Diesel goes to your motor — but plenty of modern diesels driven round Bow Street and Plas Gogerddan carry another fluid as well. AdBlue's own tank keeps it, and from there it is sent to your exhaust, and there a spray cleans the gas.
Every tank has a filler of its own. Under one flap, next to each other: that is the arrangement on many cars. Elsewhere, AdBlue's filler is beneath the bonnet or in the boot instead. Diesel gets filled at every filling station visit, again and again. A driver who has to stop and think where it goes normally fills the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and much less frequently. The mistake lives in that gap.
How AdBlue in your diesel tank occurs around Bow Street
Seldom is it carelessness: usually three things line up.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low the vehicle tells you, and if it runs out completely, the vehicle goes into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a drive off Tregerddan before work, or in the car park outside The Welsh Black on the way home.
Unfamiliar cars come second, too. Hire cars, new cars and company motors place their fillers differently, and habit goes for the cap it used on the old one.
Lastly, the bottle goes in: diesel filler or AdBlue filler, it goes in just as easily, and once the tip starts, no part stops it. The same few seconds settle it, in the middle of Bow Street or out in Y Ffald.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Look at these before pouring, on a forecourt in Bow Street or a drive out in Penrhyn-coch. Seconds, that's all.
- Where it sits misleads; the cap doesn't. AdBlue caps are often blue or carry the word "AdBlue" — diesel ones usually don't.
- The size. On plenty of cars the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- A label inside your fuel flap often shows which fuel goes where, on many cars. Check for it.
- In your boot or under the bonnet: that is where the filler is if it is not by the diesel cap, and the handbook says which.
- Ask the person who drove it last — before you leave, not when the light comes on — if you collect a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park at the nearest station.
Keeping AdBlue out of your diesel tank when you top up
Anywhere around Ceredigion the light comes on, this is a routine for that day.
- Pull in on level, motor off, with time to spare — never hurried on the side of Bryncastell.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, after you find the AdBlue filler and reading it. Daft, yes, but it works.
- If both sit under one flap, check your diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — then leave it on.
- Tip slowly, using the bottle's own spout. Stop when it is full or when the bottle is empty.
- Before you start the car, close the cap and check a second time that your diesel cap was never came off.
If at stage two or three you find you have already poured into the diesel side, stop there. Don't go on to step five.
Put AdBlue in your diesel tank in Bow Street already?
What follows is a short order of things, beginning with no starting your engine. Don't switch the ignition on; on many diesels that alone runs the fuel pump. AdBlue doesn't mix with diesel — it sinks to the bottom of that tank, where the fuel is drawn from — so do not top up with diesel to dilute it.
The attendants at the nearest petrol station, BP or another forecourt will normally lend a hand to push the vehicle away if asked. At home around Bow Street? Then the vehicle remains where it is.
If your motor has already run, stop as soon as it is safe then switch off. Bow Street lies under 50 miles from the M4; there, take the first exit. A short hop across Bow Street is a smaller job than a run towards Bangor, over 50 miles away, and so tell us roughly how far it went.
Our arrival around Bow Street, and what occurs next
Our engineers come to the car wherever it has stopped, whether that's outside the local primary school, close to Capel Y Garn or on your own driveway. What fluid was put in, the quantity, and whether it ran: we ask because the replies decide the work and price. You hear that price by phone, before anybody heads out.
Your system is then rinsed thoroughly, after the tank is drained. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, and so it does not wash out on its own — which is why that counts more here than with petrol. Filter cleaned or, if needed, replaced; clean diesel in; and then a check of the vehicle. The engine is fired up next and tested to be sure it runs properly, all before our technicians leave.
Most jobs are done in about half an hour once our engineers get there, as long as the engine has not run — and the pumps we use are fine on a live forecourt and quiet at night outside a house. Nothing in advance; you settle up that day. Afterwards, a VAT invoice and a report from the engineer go to you for the insurer. It's worth looking at your policy while we travel to you: misfuelling cover is included with many policies.
About Bow Street
Bow Street is a small coastal village in Ceredigion, situated near the Cardigan Bay coastline at an elevation of 26 metres. Bow Street has a mix of housing types, but semi-detached homes are predominant, and it is located near other small settlements such as Y Ffald and Pen-y-garn. Bow Street is part of a wider network of villages and towns in the region, including Rhydypennau, and is within driving distance of larger cities like Bangor. Bow Street has a population of around 1095 people, according to recent estimates.
AdBlue drains across Ceredigion, Bow Street included
Throughout SY postcodes, the vans covering Bow Street — a coastal village — work the surrounding spots too, Rhydypennau and Pen-y-garn among them. A postcode starting SY24 5 gets our van to you fastest.
Your car does not need to move. Draining happens right there, be it a drive, a road near Hen Gaer, or a layby towards Gogerddan Allt Ddel. Assuming won't help behind Carreg Llwyd, close to a boundary, or anywhere hard to describe; ring and check.
The short version for Bow Street motorists
Tip nothing until you have read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank anyway, leave it off and ring 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel clears it where it sits, anywhere around Ceredigion.