Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Burwood Park
Motor off, ignition off: that is where you start if AdBlue has gone into your diesel tank. Water with urea dissolved in it: that is AdBlue. It does not burn, it does not mix with diesel, and the damage it does begins when the system pulls it in. If your motor has not run yet, AdBlue in a diesel tank is normally emptied and carefully rinsed where your car sits around Burwood Park. Call 0333 366 0103 before you do anything else.
Burwood Park, AdBlue in the diesel tank: what to do straight away
Do these:
- So nobody can turn your ignition on, take your keys away.
- Put the hazards on if you're at all close to moving traffic.
- Which fluid, and roughly what amount? Save the bottle or your receipt, and we can see.
- The van locates you quickest with a postcode starting KT12 4, or simply the name of a street nearby, so phone from the spot.
Do not do these:
- Not even briefly, and not to shift the vehicle: your engine remains off.
- Switching your key to ignition by itself sets the pump running on many diesels. Skip it.
- Don't top up with diesel to dilute it. AdBlue doesn't mix in diesel; it separates out.
- Any driving at all is best avoided, even a short distance up Eriswell Road.
- Emptying that tank on your own beside the road isn't one to try.
At a forecourt around Burwood Park, whether it is the BP or another one, ask the staff to help you roll the vehicle clear of the pump. At home, the vehicle stays exactly where it is.
AdBlue in a diesel tank, and what it does there
Meant for your exhaust, AdBlue has no business in your engine. Stored in a dedicated tank, it is injected into the exhaust stream to clean the fumes. Nothing in it is supposed to pass through a fuel pump, and nothing in a fuel pump is designed to handle it.
Fuel blends; AdBlue, after tipped in, will not. Its behaviour is not at all like diesel's. Denser than diesel, it sinks and pools underneath it — the same spot the pickup sucks from. When your pump runs, the AdBlue is first to be pulled through. Before then it waits underneath the diesel, and that is how a car topped up in St Georges Hill yesterday and not started stays the simple case, provided nobody touches the key.
After it's drawn in, the harm takes two forms. As its water goes, the urea left behind crystallises, and the crystals block filters and settle in fine passages. And it's corrosive to some of the metals a fuel system is made from, so it keeps labouring on the parts it gets to for as long as it stays there. By daybreak, a car sitting around Burwood Park with AdBlue through its pipework grows worse; if it is only in that tank, it doesn't. And there is the water: it offers no protection to the components that rely on it the most — the high-pressure pump and each injector.
Petrol or AdBlue in a diesel: why AdBlue is often worse
Top up a diesel with petrol by mistake over at the Texaco, and the problem is diluted fuel. No damage is done as long as it sits put, mixed into the diesel — only once the engine runs on it.
AdBlue in a diesel is a different problem: not thin fuel, but no fuel at all. It does not burn, so it can't simply be run through. Whether your car sits in Ashley Park or the centre of Burwood Park, firing it up "to see" does more harm with AdBlue than almost any other mistake, and the flush counts for more. Why: it won't stay blended, and so diluting it fails; and deposits and corrosion outlast the following fill.
With AdBlue, the good news is no different from petrol. If the motor hasn't run, the AdBlue is still in that tank, and the tank is the simplest part of a fuel system to clear, wherever around Surrey the vehicle is sitting.
How does AdBlue end up in a diesel tank in Burwood Park?
No one means to do it. The AdBlue filler on many motors rests right next to the diesel filler, sometimes under the same flap, and the two caps can look alike in poor light. Most of the time it takes place with a bottle bought on the way home and poured in on the drive, not at the forecourt.
A couple of familiar ways account for most cases. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up occurs in a hurry outside Cleves School. A bottle is poured in at the end of the day on a drive just off Kelvedon Avenue. One more version: dim light, a pub car park by the pub in the village, and someone opening that flap for the first time.
It comes up most in a hire car, a new motor, a fleet car, or the other motor of a family with one of each fuel types — the vehicles drivers use the least. Wherever in Surrey, Burwood Park as well, the slip does not change, and neither does the first step: leave it off.
Burwood Park: started the engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank?
The AdBlue has left that tank, then. It has been drawn through the filter and the lines, and if the motor ran for any time, it has got to your high-pressure pump and your injectors.
You may notice your motor running unevenly, smoking, losing power, showing warning lights or cutting out, possibly on the way back from Old Course or halfway across Burwood Park. Once safe, stop and switch it off — with no restarting to test. Each start pulls more of that through.
If you were on the M25, under 3 miles from Burwood Park, come off at the next junction and stop somewhere safe rather than pressing on.
A quick hop across Burwood Park to the car park by St Mark's Church is one matter; heading for Westminster, under 25 miles away, is another, because every mile carries the AdBlue further in. So distance counts. Roughly how far it had come is worth telling us.
Once the engine has run, the flush includes more, and all of it is done where the car has stopped. Spotted quickly, it very rarely leaves permanent damage.
Draining AdBlue in a diesel around Burwood Park: what it takes
A road by William Whiteley Memorial, a driveway, a layby or a forecourt: anywhere your car has come to rest in Burwood Park, our engineers travel to it. Three replies shape the job, so first we ask which fluid got in, about what quantity, plus if the motor has run.
Then your tank is drained where the car waits, and so the contaminated fuel and the AdBlue come out together. Residue from AdBlue will not wash away by itself, and so the whole system gets a full flush, which matters much more here than for petrol. Next, the filter: cleaned, or replaced when it must be. After that fresh diesel, then a check of the car. Most of these jobs are a half-hour job once our technicians turn up, provided the motor hasn't run. Explosion-proof pumps make a live forecourt safe to work on, and they're quiet enough to spare the street at night.
New diesel goes in to bleed the fuel system, and that's the final step. At that point our engineers fire it up and you head off, whether from a parking space at Walton-On-Thames or a driveway in Burwood Park. It is tested on clean diesel to be sure it runs smoothly before we leave. Since the job is done in full where your car is, a garage never comes into it. Insurers want a VAT invoice and an engineer report, and both come at the end.
About Burwood Park itself
Burwood Park is a small village in Surrey, situated inland at an elevation of 39 metres, and is located approximately 16 miles from London. Burwood Park is characterized by its predominantly detached housing stock, reflecting its suburban residential nature. Burwood Park sits near several other local places, including Whiteley Village, Oatlands Park, and Hersham, and is home to around 744 residents.
AdBlue drains in Burwood Park and across Surrey
AdBlue call-outs around Burwood Park go to vans that cover the places around it — Whiteley Village, Oatlands Park as well as Hersham — and much of Surrey beyond, throughout KT postcodes. If you are close to a border, or somewhere hard to explain, ring and ask instead of assuming.
A mobile service suits Burwood Park, a rural village: there's no need to take your car to us, because our engineers drain it there, on a drive, a side street, a parking area or a filling station.
What does AdBlue in a diesel tank cost to sort out in Burwood Park?
No single figure would be fair, because every job differs. Whether the engine has been running, and for how long, comes first in what moves the price. How much AdBlue went in comes next, and then the location of the car, because an open driveway is easier for a van to get to safely than a tight spot behind Saint George's Hill Tennis Club.
What was put in, how much, and whether the engine ran: each Burwood Park call opens with exactly that, ahead of a quote, never afterwards. With them, the range narrows to one firm number.
Quoted by phone before the van sets out, the job is settled that day — card or phone, nothing in advance. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it's worth checking yours whilst we're on the way.
Beside the vehicle around Burwood Park, right now?
Then, the most helpful thing to do with the vehicle is to leave it. Ignition off, engine off, keys out. Phone 0333 366 0103 then tell us it's AdBlue, about how much, and whether it's run. Petrol in Diesel takes it from there, around Burwood Park or anywhere across Surrey.