AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Burnage: How It Happens and How to Avoid It
Leave your engine and ignition off then ring 0333 366 0103 first — the rest can wait if AdBlue is already in the diesel tank. Usually, when your motor hasn't turned, it's drained and fully flushed where the car sits in Burnage. The rest of this page covers why it takes place and how to make sure it doesn't — useful if you're reading ahead of time.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel car need its own filler?
No single fluid but two: that's what many newer diesels near Burnage and Heaton Chapel run, with diesel for the engine. Its own tank keeps it, and from there it is sent to the exhaust, where spraying treats the fumes.
There's a filler on every tank. Under one flap, side by side: that's the arrangement on many motors. On others, AdBlue's filler sits beneath the bonnet or in your boot instead. Diesel gets filled at every forecourt call-out, again and again. A driver who has to stop and think where it goes normally tops up the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and much less commonly. The mistake lives in that gap.
Burnage: how AdBlue in the diesel tank occurs
Rarely is it carelessness: usually three things line up.
First, the warning. Low AdBlue brings a warning from the vehicle, and running out means limp mode — so a hurried top-up, maybe before work off Green End Road, perhaps at The Farmers Arms on the way home after work.
Then the vehicle is unfamiliar. A hire car, a new motor or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't, and the hand hits for the cap it would have used on the old one.
Third, the spout fits: diesel filler or AdBlue filler, it slides in just as readily, and after the tip begins, nothing halts it. Whether it occurs in Heaton Moor or the middle of Burnage, it is the same few seconds.
Which filler is for AdBlue, and which for diesel?
Before you pour anything, whether on a drive in Didsbury or a forecourt in Burnage, check these. They take a couple of seconds.
- Colour and lettering: an AdBlue cap is regularly blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap normally doesn't. Trust the cap, not its position.
- Check the size: the smaller filler neck is, on many motors, the AdBlue one.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Plenty of motors say there which fuel goes where.
- The handbook. If the filler isn't by the diesel cap, it is in your boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- Picking up a hire or company car, say at the car park at Mauldeth Road? Check with whoever drove it last before leaving, not once the light goes on.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach your diesel tank
Anywhere in Greater Manchester the light comes on, this is a routine for that day.
- Park then switch off. Not on a slope, not with the engine running, and not in a rush on the side of Carrgreen Close.
- Find the AdBlue filler, check the cap, and speak the name "AdBlue" out loud while you unscrew it. It seems silly. It works.
- Both behind one flap? So confirm the cap on the diesel filler is still closed ahead of raising the bottle.
- Gently does it, through the bottle's own spout, till it's full or the bottle runs out.
- Shut the cap, then check once more — confirm the diesel cap remained closed throughout. After that, start the vehicle.
Discover at the second or third stage that AdBlue went into the wrong tank? That's where you stop. Skip stage five entirely.
AdBlue in your diesel tank already, in Burnage?
What follows is a short order of things, beginning with no starting the motor. The fuel pump starts on plenty of diesels the moment your ignition goes on — and so keep it off. Thinning it with more diesel fails, because AdBlue sinks to the base rather than mixing — and that's where the fuel is drawn from.
At a forecourt — Texaco, Shell or another — the staff will normally help roll the car clear, when you ask. Your own driveway around Burnage is where it stays.
Stop as soon as it is safe and switch off, if your motor has already run. The next exit means where to leave when you are on the M60, under 3 miles from Burnage. A short hop across Burnage is a smaller job than a run towards Manchester, under 5 miles away, and so tell us about how far it went.
Our arrival in Burnage, and what occurs next
Our engineers come to the car wherever it has stopped, whether that's outside Green End Primary School, near James Prince Lee or on your own driveway. Both the work and the price depend on three answers — what fluid, which amount, and if it has run — so we ask. During the call itself, you hear our price — before dispatch.
Next: draining, then a full flush of the entire system. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it doesn't wash out on its own — which is why the flush counts more here than with petrol. Your filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and the vehicle is tested. The engine is started next and checked to confirm it runs smoothly, all before our engineers go.
Unrun vehicles mostly need a half-hour job after arrival. The equipment is safe on a live forecourt, and hushed enough for a residential street late at night. No money in advance; you settle up that day. At the end, a VAT invoice and the report from the engineer go to you for your insurer. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it is worth checking yours whilst we're on the way.
About Burnage, for a moment
Burnage is a suburban area in Greater Manchester, situated approximately 4 miles south of Manchester city centre. Burnage sits at an elevation of around 50 metres, in a relatively flat area of the North West region. Burnage is characterised by its predominantly semi-detached housing stock, with nearby places including Heaton Moor, Heaton Mersey, and Withington. Burnage has a population of around 8594 people, according to recent estimates.
AdBlue drains across Greater Manchester, Burnage included
Heaton Mersey and Withington are among the places near Burnage, a residential suburb, that the same teams cover, over M postcodes. Our van reaches you fastest with a postcode starting M19 1.
There's no need to shift the car. Our technicians drain it where it is — a side street near Burnage Library, a lay-by on the way to Heaton Moor Golf Club, a driveway. Assuming won't help at the back of St Margaret's, on a boundary, or somewhere awkward to describe; phone and check.
In short, for Burnage motorists
Tip nothing until you've read the cap. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it stands, anywhere in Greater Manchester, if AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank all the same — and so leave the vehicle off and phone 0333 366 0103.