Camelsdale: AdBlue in the Diesel Tank? Leave It Off
AdBlue in your diesel tank? Then keep your motor off — and your ignition too. Urea dissolved in water is what AdBlue is. As it is water-based, it won't burn and never combines with diesel; damage just starts when your pump begins pulling it. If the motor hasn't run yet, AdBlue in a diesel tank is normally emptied and carefully flushed where the car stands in Camelsdale. Ring 0333 366 0103 before you do anything else.
Camelsdale, AdBlue in the diesel tank: what to do straight away
Do:
- Take the keys out, and so no one switches the ignition on.
- If you're at all close to moving traffic, put your hazards on.
- So you can give us which fluid it was and roughly what quantity, keep your receipt or the empty bottle.
- Tell us a postcode starting GU27 3, or whichever street lies closest, and the van reaches you straight — so ring from wherever you are.
Do not:
- Not even for a second, and not to shift the car: your motor remains off.
- Your ignition remains off: on lots of diesels, switching it on is enough to run the fuel pump.
- Adding extra diesel doesn't help: AdBlue separates out instead of thinning.
- Even a short way down Upper School Drive is too far to drive the car.
- By the road, do not attempt draining it on your own.
On a forecourt around Camelsdale, whether it's the Arnolds Garage or another one, ask the staff to help you roll the car away from the petrol pump. If you're on your own drive, leave it precisely where it sits.
AdBlue in a diesel tank: what it does
AdBlue is made for the exhaust, not the motor. Stored in a separate tank, it's squirted into the exhaust stream to treat the gases. Nothing in it is supposed to pass through a fuel pump, and nothing in a fuel pump is designed to handle it.
Inside a diesel tank it behaves very differently from fuel. It doesn't mix in. It is heavier than diesel, so it sinks and gathers at the bottom of that tank, which is where the pickup sucks fuel from. A motor filled on a drive in Woolmer Hill yesterday evening and left unstarted is the straightforward case. Nothing has sucked the AdBlue up yet — but when your engine runs, that is what is pulled first, directly from the bottom of that tank.
Two kinds of damage come from there. What remains when the water goes is urea, which forms crystals: they lodge in tiny channels and clog filters. Worse, it eats at certain metals in a fuel system, and keeps going till it's flushed out. By daybreak, a vehicle sitting around Camelsdale with AdBlue in its lines gets worse; if it's just in that tank, it doesn't. The water in it does harm of its own: your high-pressure pump and your injectors rely on diesel to lubricate them, and water gives them nothing.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel frequently the bigger problem?
An issue of thin fuel is what you end up with after fuelling a diesel with petrol from the Asda Express. Mixed through the diesel and sitting still, it is harmless for now; using the engine does the damage.
The trouble with AdBlue in a diesel is a completely wrong liquid. Not burning, it cannot just be run through. It does not stay mixed, and so it can't be diluted. And crystals and corrosion don't wash out with the next tank of fuel. That is why the flush matters more with AdBlue than with petrol, and why starting your motor "to see" costs more here than nearly anywhere else, whether the car is in Hammer Bottom or the middle of Camelsdale.
As with petrol, there is good news. Anywhere around West Sussex your vehicle has come to rest, an unrun motor means the AdBlue yet inside the tank: the easiest part of any fuel system to empty.
Camelsdale: how AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank
It's not deliberate. Plenty of cars have the AdBlue inlet beside the diesel inlet, now and then under one flap, and mixing them up is simple in poor light. Mostly it's not the filling station: someone buys a container driving home and pours it in at home.
Usually, it takes place in one of a few familiar ways. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up occurs in a hurry outside Camelsdale Primary School. Near Camelsdale Road, someone tips a bottle in at home after work. Or someone new to that flap refills your car in dim light, parked in the car park by The Mill.
It takes place most in the vehicles motorists know least: a hire car, a new vehicle, a company car, or the second car of a household with one diesel and one petrol. Wherever in West Sussex, Camelsdale as well, the mistake doesn't change, and nor does the first step: keep it switched off.
Camelsdale: started your engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank?
If so, the AdBlue is no longer in your tank. With any running time, it goes on to the injection pump and each injector, after passing through the fuel filter and pipework.
Rough running, smoke from the exhaust, dropping power, dashboard lights or cutting out: each may show up, perhaps part way across Camelsdale or returning from Sicklemill Open Space. Pull over when it is safe. Switch off. Leave the car off instead of testing it again. Each start pulls more of that through.
Exit the M3, under 25 miles from Camelsdale, by the next junction and stop somewhere safe, not carrying on.
Mileage matters: each mile carries the AdBlue further in, so driving for Chichester, under 25 miles away, gives a far bigger job than hopping across Camelsdale to the car park by St Paul, Camelsdale. Approximately how far had it come? Tell us.
Once the engine has run, the flush includes more, and all of it is done where your car has stopped. Very rarely does it leave long-term damage if it's noticed quickly.
Camelsdale: how AdBlue is emptied from a diesel
A street beside Haslemere Leisure Centre, a driveway, a lay-by or a forecourt: anywhere the vehicle has stopped in Camelsdale, our technicians travel to it. What went in, about how much, and if the engine has been run: our technicians check before all else, because those decide the job.
The contaminated diesel and the urea leave as one after your tank is emptied, on the spot. The fuel system is purged thoroughly, which matters more with AdBlue than with petrol, since what it leaves behind does not rinse out on its own. Fresh diesel goes in after the filter is flushed — or swapped, if it needs to be — and then the vehicle is tested. Most of these jobs are a half-hour job once our technicians turn up, provided your motor has not run. The pumps are explosion-proof, fine on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark.
Lastly, the fuel system is bled with fresh diesel. At that point we fire it up and you head off, whether from a parking bay outside Haslemere or a driveway around Camelsdale. Our engineers confirm it runs properly on new diesel before leaving. Since the job is done in its entirety where the vehicle is, a garage never comes into it. Insurers want a VAT invoice and an engineer report, and both come afterwards.
About Camelsdale
Camelsdale is a suburban area situated on the riverside in West Sussex, with an elevation of around 136 metres. Camelsdale lies near the villages of Shottermill and Critchmere, and is close to the settlement of Hammer. Camelsdale has a population of approximately 2465 people, predominantly living in detached housing.
AdBlue drains in Camelsdale and across West Sussex
Throughout the GU postcode area, the teams taking AdBlue call-outs around Camelsdale serve most of West Sussex too, Shottermill, Critchmere and Hammer among them. Assuming won't help close to a border or somewhere tricky to pin down; phone and check.
Wherever your vehicle stands — your drive at home, a residential street, a parking area, a filling station — we empty it on the spot, and there's no need to take it to us; which suits Camelsdale, a residential suburb, well.
What does AdBlue in a diesel tank cost to sort out around Camelsdale?
No single price would be fair, since every job is different. What shifts the price is, first, whether your engine has run and for how long; then how much AdBlue went in; and then where your car is and whether a technician can reach it safely, which is simpler on an open drive than in a tight space behind St Stephen's Church.
Which fluid went in, how much, and whether the engine ran: every Camelsdale call begins with exactly that, before a quote, never afterwards. Given those replies, the range shrinks to one firm number.
You get that price by phone, before anybody heads out, and you pay on the day, by card or by phone, with nothing upfront. Look at your policy while we're on the way: many carry misfuelling cover.
Still alongside your car in Camelsdale?
Then the most handy thing you can do is nothing to the vehicle. Keys out; engine and ignition off. Phone 0333 366 0103 then tell us it is AdBlue, about how much, and whether it has run. Petrol in Diesel takes it from there, around Camelsdale or anywhere in West Sussex.