AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Broadway: How It Occurs and How to Stop It
Pause reading a minute when your diesel tank already holds AdBlue in it: ignition off, motor off, and call 0333 366 0103. Caught before the motor runs, it's generally a drain and a thorough flush, done where the vehicle is in Broadway. If you're reading before it has happened, the remainder of this page is about why it occurs and how to make sure it doesn't.
AdBlue in a diesel car: two tanks, two fillers
Diesel feeds your engine — yet many modern diesels seen around Broadway and Charing Hill hold a second liquid too. The exhaust, not your engine, is where AdBlue ends up: sprayed into the gas to fresh it, from its own tank.
Every tank comes with one filler of its own. Some cars keep the AdBlue filler in your boot or under the bonnet; a lot of others place the two together behind one flap. At the petrol pump, your diesel side gets filled all the time. The AdBlue side is fuelled far less often, normally from a bottle, and normally by somebody who has to stop and think where it goes. The mistake grows in the gap between them.
Broadway: how AdBlue in the diesel tank occurs
It is seldom carelessness. Three things tend to line up.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low the car tells you, and if it runs out altogether, the car goes into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a drive off Pluckley Road before work, or in the car park outside the pub in the village on the way home.
The old car's cap is where the hand reaches — yet a rental car, a new motor or a company car puts the fillers somewhere else. That is a second factor: a strange vehicle.
A spout-topped bottle finds no resistance at a diesel filler no more than at an AdBlue one. So the tip, once begun, keeps on. Whether it occurs in Coppins Corner or the middle of Broadway, it's the same few seconds.
Telling the AdBlue filler from your diesel filler
Before you tip anything, whether on a driveway in Charing Heath or a forecourt around Broadway, check these. They take a couple of seconds.
- Read the cap instead of going by position: AdBlue ones are frequently blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel ones normally are not.
- Many motors fit AdBlue the smaller filler of the two.
- The flap. Look inside the fuel flap for a label. Plenty of cars say there which fuel goes where.
- In your boot or under the bonnet: that is where your filler is if it's not by the diesel cap, and the handbook tells you which.
- The previous driver knows. Ask when you pick up a hire car or company car — at Charing's car park, perhaps — rather than when the light comes on.
Keeping AdBlue out of the diesel tank when you top up
When the light comes on, anywhere across Kent, use this routine.
- Park and switch off. Not on a slope, not with the motor running, and not in a rush on the side of Charing Heath Road.
- Locate the AdBlue filler, read the cap, and speak the word "AdBlue" aloud while you unscrew it. It seems silly. It does the trick.
- If both sit under one flap, check the diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — and leave the vehicle on.
- Pour slowly, using the bottle's own spout. Stop when it is full or when the bottle is empty.
- Close the cap and check a second time. Make sure your diesel cap was never opened. Only then start the vehicle.
Discover during the second or third step that the bottle went into the diesel filler? That is where you stop. Do not go on to stage five.
Already put AdBlue in the diesel tank around Broadway?
Then the order of things is short. Do not start the engine. Do not switch your ignition on; on many diesels that alone runs the fuel pump. Do not top up with diesel to thin it: AdBlue doesn't mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of that tank, where your fuel is sucked from.
The attendants at Charing Motors Ltd., Esso or any forecourt will normally help pushing the car clear when asked. Your own drive around Broadway is where it should stay.
Where the engine has been run already, pull over somewhere safe and turn the vehicle off. The next junction means where to come off when you are on the M20, under a mile from Broadway. Mileage counts — a short hop across Broadway makes a smaller job than heading under 15 miles towards Canterbury — so say roughly how far it went.
Our arrival around Broadway, and what occurs next
Wherever your car came to rest, be it outside Charing Church of England Primary School, beside Charing Village Hall or on your own drive, our van travels to it. Our engineers ask what got in, about how much, and whether it's run, because those answers decide this work and our quote. No one sets off before you've had our price by phone.
Then your tank is cleared and the fuel system flushed thoroughly. Much more than with petrol, it counts here: the crystals build up, certain metals are attacked, and none of that clears out unaided, no matter how long it sits. After your filter has been cleaned — or renewed, if required — clean diesel goes in, and then the car is tested. After that we start the engine and make sure it runs correctly before we leave.
With pumps fine on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night, most jobs where the motor hasn't run take about half an hour once our technicians are there. Paying is on the day, not upfront, and you receive the paperwork your insurer wants: an engineer's report and a VAT invoice. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it's worth checking yours whilst we're on the way.
About Broadway
Broadway is a small suburban area in Kent, situated inland at an elevation of 86 metres, and is located near the villages of Coppins Corner, Charing, and Westwell Leacon. Broadway has a population of around 938 residents, who mostly live in detached houses. Broadway is positioned approximately 13.6 miles from Canterbury and 44.7 miles from London, making it a relatively rural community within the South East region.
AdBlue drains around Broadway and across Kent
Over TN postcodes, our teams that cover Broadway — a residential suburb — work the surrounding places too, Westwell Leacon and Charing included. Our van reaches you fastest with a postcode starting TN27 0.
The vehicle doesn't need to shift. We drain it where it is — a side street close to Charing Library, a lay-by on the way to Beesmount, a drive. Guessing won't help behind St Peter & St Paul, on a boundary, or somewhere awkward to describe; phone and ask.
Broadway drivers: the short version
Tip no AdBlue until you have read the cap. Petrol in Diesel empties it where it stands, anywhere around Kent, if AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank anyway — so leave it off and phone 0333 366 0103.