Preventing AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Bridge End: Why It Happens
Keep your motor and ignition off and ring 0333 366 0103 now — reading can wait if AdBlue is already in your diesel tank. Normally, when the motor has not run, it's emptied and thoroughly rinsed where the car is in Bridge End. The remainder of this page covers why it takes place and how to make sure it doesn't — useful if you're reading before it has happened.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel motor
Not one liquid but two: that's what many modern diesels near Bridge End and Little Wittenham run, with diesel for the engine. AdBlue goes to the exhaust, where it is sprayed into the gas to fresh it, and it lives in a tank of its own.
There's a filler for every tank. Many of cars share a single flap for both, while others put the AdBlue filler to your boot or under the bonnet. The diesel side is filled at the pump all the time. Rarely filled, AdBlue usually goes in from a bottle, poured by someone who must stop and think what cap to use. Mistakes happen in that gap between the two.
How does AdBlue in the diesel tank happen around Bridge End?
Three things tend to come together, and carelessness is rarely one of them.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low your car tells you, and if it runs out altogether, the car drops into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a drive off Watling Lane before work, or in the car park outside Fleur de Lys on the way home.
Then your car is unfamiliar. A hire car, a new car or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't, and your hand reaches for the cap it would have used on the old one.
No part stops the tip after it has started, because a bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as readily as an AdBlue one. The bottle fits. Dorchester or the middle of Bridge End: it takes the same few seconds either way.
The AdBlue filler and the diesel filler: telling them apart
Check these first, on a forecourt in Bridge End or a drive out in Shillingford. A few seconds, no more.
- Blue and lettering: an AdBlue cap is often blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap usually does not. Trust the cap, not where it sits.
- On many vehicles, size tells: AdBlue gets the smaller filler neck.
- The flap. Look inside the fuel flap for a label. Plenty of vehicles say there which fuel goes where.
- The handbook says where it lives if the filler is not next to your diesel cap: the boot, or under the bonnet.
- Picking up a hire or company car, perhaps at the car park at Culham? Ask whoever drove the car last before leaving, not when the light comes on.
Keeping AdBlue out of the diesel tank when you top up
Anywhere around Oxfordshire the light comes on, this is a routine for that day.
- Pull in on level, motor off, with time in hand — never rushing on the side of Samian Way.
- 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 both share a flap, make sure it's closed before lifting the bottle.
- Pour slowly, using the bottle's own spout. Stop when it's full or when the bottle is empty.
- Shut the cap, then check again — making sure your diesel filler stayed shut throughout. Only then, start your car.
Stop there if you find, at step two or three, that you have already poured into your diesel side. Never carry on to step five.
Already put AdBlue in your diesel tank in Bridge End?
What follows is a short order of things, beginning with not starting the engine. Keep your ignition off as well, since on many diesels switching it on by itself starts your fuel pump. Diluting it with more diesel won't work, because AdBlue sinks to the base instead of mixing — and that's where your fuel is drawn from.
If you are on a forecourt, whether it is the BP or the Murco, ask the attendants to help roll the car away from the petrol pump. If you're on your own drive around Bridge End, leave the vehicle where it is.
Where your motor has run by now, pull over safely then turn the car off. On the Wheatley Spur, under 10 miles from Bridge End, that means the next junction. Roughly how far did it go? Hopping across Bridge End is less work than a run of under 10 miles to Oxford, and so say.
What happens when we get there around Bridge End
The van reaches the vehicle wherever it stopped — your own drive, near St Birinus, or outside Dorchester St Birinus Church of England School. What fluid got in, the quantity, and whether it ran: our engineers ask since those replies decide the work and quote. No one sets off until you have heard our price by phone.
Draining the tank comes next, then a full flush of the 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 fuel filter is flushed, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and the car is tested. Before we leave, our technicians start the engine and make sure that it's running properly.
Using pumps fine on a working forecourt and quiet enough for use outside a house at night, most jobs where your motor has not run take about half an hour after our technicians are there. You pay on the day, with nothing upfront, and get a VAT invoice and an engineer report for your insurer. While we travel, have a look at your policy; many carry cover for misfuelling.
About Bridge End, for a moment
Bridge End is a suburban area situated on the riverside in Oxfordshire, with a mix of detached housing and a population of around 733 residents. Bridge End lies approximately 8.7 miles from Oxford and 45.5 miles from London, making it a commuter-friendly location. Bridge End is close to nearby places such as Dorchester, Overy, and Meadside, and its elevation of 51 metres gives it a relatively low-lying position in the surrounding landscape.
AdBlue drains in Bridge End and across Oxfordshire
Overy and Meadside are among the places near Bridge End, a residential suburb, that the same vans cover, over OX postcodes. The van gets to you fastest with a postcode starting OX10 7.
The car stays where it is. A driveway, a lay-by on the way to Church Farm, a side street close to Dorchester Abbey: our engineers drain the car where it sits. Awkward to pin down, like the back of Dorchester Abbey Museum and Gift Shop? By a county line? Asking beats guessing, so phone.
The short version for Bridge End motorists
Pour no AdBlue till you have read the cap. Petrol in Diesel drains it on the spot, anywhere around Oxfordshire, if AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank all the same — and so leave the vehicle off then call 0333 366 0103.