Broom Hill: AdBlue in the Diesel Tank? Leave It Off
AdBlue in your diesel tank? Then leave your engine off — and the ignition as well. Water with urea dissolved in it: that's AdBlue. Unlike fuel, it neither burns nor blends, and nothing happens until your motor sucks it round. In Broom Hill, AdBlue in a diesel tank found before the motor runs usually means a drain and a thorough flush, just where the vehicle is. Phone 0333 366 0103 before you do anything else.
Your next steps right now, Broom Hill: AdBlue in your diesel tank
Things to do:
- Remove the keys, which prevents anyone turning the electrics on.
- If you are anywhere near moving traffic, put the hazard lights on.
- The empty bottle or the receipt tells us the fluid and the quantity, so do not throw it away.
- The van finds you fastest with a postcode starting TS17 5, or simply the name of a street nearby, so phone from the spot.
Don't:
- Not even briefly, and not to roll the car: the engine remains off.
- The ignition stays off: on lots of diesels, turning it on is enough to run your pump.
- Do not top up with diesel to thin it. AdBlue does not dilute in diesel; it separates out.
- Even a short distance up Hilden Park is too far to drive the vehicle.
- Beside the road, do not attempt emptying it on your own.
Ask the attendants to help you roll the vehicle away from the pumps if you're on a forecourt in Broom Hill, whether it's the Tesco or somewhere else. Parked on your own driveway? Then it stays just where it is.
AdBlue in a diesel tank, and what it does there
The motor isn't what AdBlue is made for; the exhaust is. It goes into its own tank and is sprayed into your exhaust gas to clean it. Nothing in it is supposed to pass through a fuel pump, and nothing in a fuel pump is made to handle it.
Fuel blends; AdBlue, once poured in, won't. The behaviour is nothing like fuel's. It is heavier than diesel, so it sinks and collects at the bottom of the tank, which is where the pickup draws fuel from. The first thing your fuel system pulls through, once it runs, is the AdBlue. So a car that had AdBlue poured in on a drive in Preston-on-Tees last night, and has not been started since, is still the straightforward case: the AdBlue is lying at the bottom of your tank, and nothing has pulled it in.
Two kinds of harm come from there. It attacks certain metals found in fuel systems, attacking any part it reaches till it's removed completely. And when the water evaporates, the urea turns into crystals that block filters and settle in narrow channels. Where the AdBlue has reached the pipework, leaving it till morning around Broom Hill leaves things worse. In the tank only, time does nothing. And there's the water: it offers no lubrication to the parts that need it most — the injection pump and every injector.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel often the bigger issue?
Fill a diesel with petrol by mistake at the Shell, and this issue is thinned fuel. No harm comes while it sits put, mixed into your diesel — only once the motor works on it.
The issue with AdBlue in a diesel is a completely wrong substance. Because it does not burn, running it through isn't an option. Whether the vehicle sits in Eaglescliffe or the centre of Broom Hill, turning it over "to see" does more harm with AdBlue than nearly any other slip, and the flush matters more. The reasons: it will not remain mixed, so diluting it is impossible; and deposits and corrosion survive the following tankful.
As with petrol, there's good news. Wherever around North Yorkshire the vehicle has stopped, an unrun motor means the AdBlue yet inside the tank: the simplest part of a fuel system to empty.
Broom Hill: how AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank
After dark, two caps together — the AdBlue cap and the diesel cap, now and then under one flap — may appear the same. No one means it; plenty of layouts invite it. A bottle picked up when driving home and tipped in at home, rather than at the filling station, is the typical route.
Mostly, it happens in one of a couple of familiar ways. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up occurs in a hurry outside St Francis of Assisi Church of England Primary School. Close to Broom Hill Avenue, someone tips a bottle in at home after work. Else, after dark outside The Teal Arms, the vehicle gets topped up by a driver using that flap for the first time.
It crops up the most in a hire car, a brand-new vehicle, a fleet vehicle, or the spare car of a family with one of each fuels — the vehicles people know the least. Wherever you're around Broom Hill or the rest of North Yorkshire, it is the same mistake and the same first answer: leave it off.
Broom Hill: started your engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank?
Then the AdBlue has left that tank. It's been drawn through your filter and your lines, and if your motor ran for any time, it has reached your high-pressure pump and the fuel injectors.
You may notice your motor running roughly, smoking, losing power, showing warning lights or cutting out, maybe on the way back from Bowood Park or halfway across Broom Hill. No restarting to check: pull over when it is safe, then switch everything off. With each start, more of that is pulled through.
Exit the A1(M), under 15 miles from Broom Hill, at the first junction and stop somewhere safe, rather than carrying on.
Distance matters: each mile carries the AdBlue further in, so driving for Durham, under 25 miles away, gives a much bigger job than crossing Broom Hill to the car park by The Rings Community Hub. Approximately how far had it come? Tell us.
There's more to clean out once your engine has been started, and we do all of it where the vehicle has stopped. Caught soon, it very seldom leaves lasting damage.
What does an AdBlue drain on a diesel involve in Broom Hill?
We come to your car, wherever it has stopped around Broom Hill: a side street close to Ingleby Barwick Town Council, a drive, a lay-by or a forecourt. Before anything else our technicians ask what got in, about how much, and if the engine has been run, since those answers decide this work.
The polluted diesel and the urea come out together when that tank is drained, right there. Residue from AdBlue will not wash out by itself, and so the whole system gets a careful flush, which matters much more with urea than with petrol. A test of your vehicle follows at the end, once clean diesel is added and your filter gets cleaned or, if necessary, replaced. The majority of these jobs are a half-hour visit once we arrive, provided your engine hasn't run. Explosion-proof pumps mean a busy forecourt sensible to work on, and they're quiet enough to spare the street at night.
Last, the fuel system is bled with clean diesel. Whether it's a parking bay outside Eaglescliffe or a drive in Broom Hill, that is where our technicians fire it up and you set off. Before we leave, our technicians make sure it's running properly with new diesel in. The entire job is done where the vehicle is, so it never needs to go to a workshop. The insurer is likely to want an engineer's report and the VAT invoice — each handed over afterwards.
About Broom Hill itself
Broom Hill is a suburban area located on the riverside in North Yorkshire, with an elevation of 32 metres. Broom Hill sits near the cities of Durham and Middlesbrough, and is close to nearby places such as The Rings, Ingleby Barwick, and Roundhill Village. Broom Hill is characterised by its predominantly detached housing stock, and is home to a population of around 7970 residents. Broom Hill is situated approximately 214 miles north of London, in the north-east of England.
Broom Hill and North Yorkshire: AdBlue drains across the area
The teams that answer AdBlue calls in Broom Hill also cover the places round it, The Rings, Ingleby Barwick and Roundhill Village among them, and most of North Yorkshire beyond, across the TS postcode area. If you're near a boundary, or somewhere hard to describe, ring and ask rather than assuming.
No moving is needed. In Broom Hill, a residential suburb, a van that comes to you fits: your car is emptied where it stands, whether on a driveway, a residential street, a car park or a forecourt.
What AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to put right in Broom Hill
No flat price would be fair, since each job is different. The price shifts first with how long, if at all, the engine has been running, and next with the amount of AdBlue that was put in. After that it turns on where your car is and whether our van can get to it safely, which is simpler on an open drive than in a tight gap behind Greenside.
Which fluid went in, how much, and whether it ran: every Broom Hill call begins with exactly that, ahead of any quote, never after. Those replies shrink the range right down to a single figure.
Before a van heads out, you are told our quote by phone. And payment is on the day, by card or by phone, with nothing upfront. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it is worth checking yours whilst we're on the way.
Alongside the vehicle in Broom Hill, still?
Not touching your car is, right now, the best move open to you. Keys out; motor and ignition off. Petrol in Diesel handles the remainder, across Broom Hill or anywhere within North Yorkshire, once you ring 0333 366 0103 saying it's AdBlue, roughly what quantity, and if the engine ran.