Brandhall: AdBlue in the Diesel Tank? Leave It Off
AdBlue in the diesel tank? Then keep your engine off — and your ignition too. AdBlue is urea dissolved in water. It doesn't burn, it does not mix with diesel, and the harm it does starts when the fuel system draws it in. In Brandhall, AdBlue in a diesel tank found before the engine runs usually means a drain and a thorough flush, just where the car is. First, phone us on 0333 366 0103.
Those opening minutes: AdBlue in the diesel tank in Brandhall
Do these:
- Take your keys out, and so no one switches the ignition on.
- Close to moving traffic? So put the hazards on.
- The empty bottle or your receipt shows us the fluid and the quantity, and so do not bin it out.
- The van finds you quickest with a postcode starting B68 0, or just the name of a street close by, and so phone from the car.
Things not to do:
- Not even for a second, and not to shift the vehicle: the motor stays off.
- Turning your key to ignition by itself sets the pump running on plenty of diesels. Skip it.
- No extra fuel added. The AdBlue won't blend, so it is wasted.
- Don't drive it anywhere, not even a short stretch up Pitfields Close.
- By the road, do not attempt draining it on your own.
On a forecourt in Brandhall, whether it is the Murco or another one, ask the attendants to help you roll your car clear of the pump. Parked on your own drive? Then it stays exactly where it is.
What does AdBlue do in a diesel tank?
Made for your exhaust, AdBlue has no business in your motor. Its own tank keeps it, and from there it's fed into your exhaust, where it treats the fumes. Nothing in it is supposed to pass through a fuel pump, and nothing in a fuel pump is made to handle it.
Tipped in with your diesel, it stays apart instead of mixing — entirely unlike fuel. The intake sucks fuel from the deepest part of that tank, and that's precisely where AdBlue ends up: being denser than diesel, it sinks. The first thing the system pulls through, once it runs, is the AdBlue. So a motor that had AdBlue poured in on a drive in Hilltop last night, and hasn't been started since, is still the easy case: the AdBlue is lying at the bottom of your tank, and nothing has sucked it in.
From there it does two kinds of harm. Crystals and corrosion. As the water dries, it leaves urea that hardens in filters and tiny channels; and, because it eats at some metals, every part it reaches keeps suffering for as long as it remains inside. Pipes carrying AdBlue mean damage overnight for a car parked in Brandhall. Only in that tank, it stays the same. Water protects nothing. The injection pump and each injector need diesel flowing through them, and so the water content damages them in its own right.
Why AdBlue in a diesel is often more serious than petrol
A fault of thin fuel is what you get from fuelling a diesel with petrol from the Applegreen. Harm just comes from running on it. Mixed into the diesel and sitting in your tank, it causes none.
AdBlue in a diesel is a problem of the wrong substance altogether. It doesn't burn, so it can't just be run through. Crystals and corrosion stay through the next fill, and AdBlue splits again from your diesel, so watering it can't help. Hence the flush matters more, and turning your key "to see" does more harm with AdBlue than nearly any other slip — in Ridgacre or the heart of Brandhall alike.
As with petrol, there is good news. Anywhere in West Midlands the car has come to rest, an unrun motor means the AdBlue yet inside the reservoir: the simplest bit of a fuel system to empty.
How does AdBlue end up in a diesel tank in Brandhall?
In dim light, two caps side by side — the AdBlue one and the diesel one, now and then under a single flap — may look the same. Nobody intends it; plenty of designs allow it. A bottle bought while heading home and poured in outside the house, rather than at the filling station, is the typical route.
A couple of familiar ways cover the majority of them. Midway through the drop-off, the dashboard warns, and outside Brandhall Primary School the top-up is hurried. A bottle is poured in at the end of the day on a drive just off Tame Road. Or your car is topped up in the car park outside Full Moon, in poor light, by a person who has never opened that flap before.
The least familiar vehicles see it most — hire cars, new cars, fleet ones, and the spare car in a family with one of each fuel types. Leave it switched off: that is the first response to the same slip, wherever in Brandhall or the rest of West Midlands you are.
Brandhall: started the motor with AdBlue in the diesel tank?
The AdBlue has left that tank, then. It's been drawn through the filter and the fuel lines, and if your engine ran for any time, it has got to your high-pressure pump and the injectors.
You may notice your motor running unevenly, smoking, losing power, showing warning lights or cutting out, perhaps on the way back from Black Country Millennium Forest or halfway across Brandhall. Stop when safe. Turn off. Keep the car off instead of restarting it to check. With each start, more of that is pulled through.
On the M5, under a mile from Brandhall, the first junction is where to leave, and somewhere sensible is where to stop — not driving on.
Every mile carries the AdBlue deeper into your system. That is why a hop across Brandhall to park beside King's Community Church and a drive of under 5 miles for Birmingham are very distinct jobs. Approximately how far had it come? Tell us.
There's more to clean out once the engine has been started, and our engineers do all of it where your car has come to a stop. Very rarely does it leave permanent damage if it is caught soon.
Brandhall: how AdBlue is emptied from a diesel
The car remains where it is, whether that is a road near Brandhall Library, a drive, a layby or a filling station in Brandhall, and the van comes to it. Three answers shape the job, so first our technicians ask which fluid went in, roughly the amount, and whether your motor has turned over.
The polluted diesel and the urea come out as one after your tank is emptied, on the spot. A careful flush matters far more after AdBlue than after petrol, because residue won't clear away on its own. The fuel filter is flushed, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and the car is tested. Most of these jobs are a half-hour visit once our technicians arrive, if the engine has not run. The pumps are explosion-proof, fine on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night.
New diesel goes in to bleed the fuel system, and that is the last step. Firing it up comes next, and then you head off from where your car is parked, by Rowley Regis or on a drive in Brandhall. It is checked on new diesel to be sure it runs smoothly before our technicians leave. Our engineers do it all wherever the car has ended up, and it never has to go to a workshop. At the end, there is paperwork for the insurer: a VAT invoice and a written report from the engineer.
About Brandhall, for a moment
Brandhall is a suburban area in the West Midlands, situated near the River Rea and close to the city of Birmingham. Brandhall sits at an elevation of 202 metres, with a mix of semi-detached housing and local amenities. Brandhall is located near other residential areas, including Hurst Green and Bristnall Fields, and is around 4.6 miles from Birmingham city centre. Brandhall has a population of approximately 4830 residents.
Brandhall and West Midlands: AdBlue drains across the area
Over the B postcode area, the teams taking AdBlue call-outs in Brandhall reach much of West Midlands too, Hurst Green, Bristnall Fields and Causeway Green among them. Phone and check rather than guess if you're by a county line, or anywhere tricky to explain.
No towing is needed. In Brandhall, a residential suburb, a mobile service fits: the vehicle is drained on the spot, be it in a driveway, a residential street, a parking area or a filling station.
AdBlue in a diesel tank in Brandhall: the cost of fixing it
Because the callouts differ, a single price wouldn't be honest. What shifts the price is, first of all, whether the engine has been running and for how long; then how much AdBlue went in; and finally where the vehicle is and whether our van can reach it safely, which is simpler on an open driveway than in a tight space behind Reel Cinemas.
For that in mind, each call from Brandhall opens with the identical trio — which fluid got in, what quantity, whether it ran — before a quote. Given them, a range narrows to one fixed number.
Before anyone sets off, you are told our price on the phone. And you pay on the day, by card or over the phone, with nothing upfront. Misfuelling cover comes with many insurance policies, so it pays to look at yours before the van arrives.
In Brandhall and still beside your car?
Then, the best thing to do with the vehicle is to leave it. Keys out; motor and ignition off. Say it was AdBlue, roughly what quantity, and whether it ran, on 0333 366 0103. From there Petrol in Diesel handles it, in Brandhall or wherever within West Midlands.