Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Canworthy
AdBlue in the diesel tank? Then leave your engine off — and your ignition as well. Urea dissolved in water is what AdBlue is. As it is water-based, it will not burn and never combines with diesel; trouble just starts once your pump starts pulling it. Caught before your engine has run, AdBlue in a diesel tank is normally a drain and a thorough flush, done where your car is in Canworthy. Nothing comes before ringing 0333 366 0103.
AdBlue in the diesel tank in Canworthy: the first few minutes
Do:
- So no one can turn the ignition on, pull the keys out.
- Near moving traffic? Then put the hazards on.
- The empty bottle or the till receipt tells us the fluid and the amount, so don't bin it out.
- Call right where you are. Say a PL15 8 postcode or the nearest street sign, and no one has to hunt for you.
Never:
- Not even briefly, and not to shift the vehicle: the engine stays off.
- Do not switch your ignition on. On plenty of diesels that alone runs the fuel pump.
- Do not top up with diesel to dilute it. AdBlue does not mix in diesel; it separates out.
- Even a short stretch along Knapmedown is too far to drive the car.
- Emptying that tank on your own beside the road isn't worth trying.
The staff on duty at any Canworthy filling station — the Gulf included — will usually help rolling it aside if you ask. At home, your car stays exactly as it was left.
AdBlue in a diesel tank: what it does
Not your engine but the exhaust is where AdBlue belongs. From a separate tank it is fed straight to your exhaust, treating what the engine emits. A fuel pump isn't made to take it, and AdBlue was never supposed to go through one.
It does not blend. After it is tipped into a tank of diesel, AdBlue acts not at all like fuel. It drops, because it's denser than diesel, and pools down where the intake draws its supply from. Simplest of all: one that got AdBlue in South Wheatley last night and hasn't turned since. The AdBlue waits at the base of the tank, undrawn — but it would be the first thing through if the motor starts, ahead of any diesel at all.
From there it causes two kinds of harm. As its water goes, the urea left behind crystallises, and the crystals block filters and settle in fine passages. And it is corrosive to some of the metals a fuel system is made from, and so it keeps working on the components it gets to for as long as it stays there. If the AdBlue is in the pipework, waiting overnight in Canworthy makes it worse. In that tank only, time does nothing. Water lubricates nothing. The injection pump and every injector need diesel running through them, so the water content damages them by itself.
AdBlue in a diesel: why it is regularly worse than petrol
A fault of thin fuel is what you end up with after fuelling a diesel with petrol from the Essar. Blended into your diesel and left unused, it's harmless at that stage; running the engine is the damage.
AdBlue in a diesel is a different matter: not thin fuel, yet no fuel at all. Since it does not burn, running it through isn't an option. Whether your car sits in Maxworthy or the centre of Canworthy, firing it up "to see" does more harm with AdBlue than nearly any other slip, and the flush matters for more. Why: it won't stay blended, so diluting it is impossible; and crystals and corrosion outlast the following fill.
With AdBlue, the good news is no different from petrol. Anywhere around Cornwall the car has come to rest, an unrun motor leaves the AdBlue yet inside the reservoir: the simplest part of a fuel system to clear.
How does AdBlue end up in a diesel tank in Canworthy?
Plenty of vehicles put the AdBlue cap beside the diesel one, occasionally behind one flap, and in dim light the two can look identical. Nobody means it. A container bought when driving home and tipped in outside the house, rather than at the forecourt, is the typical route.
Usually, it takes place in one of a couple of familiar ways. Hurrying, outside Warbstow Primary Academy, after a warning light flashed on during the school run, a parent tops up the car. In the evening, a container goes in on a driveway close to Bury Close. Or the vehicle is topped up in the car park at the pub in the village, in poor light, by somebody who has never opened that flap before.
Hired vehicles, brand-new motors, fleet vehicles, or the second vehicle in a family with one of each: the least familiar vehicles see it most. Same slip, same first step — leave it switched off — wherever you happen to be around Canworthy or the remainder of Cornwall.
AdBlue in your diesel tank around Canworthy, and the engine started?
Then your tank is no longer where the AdBlue is. It has been sucked through the filter and your lines, and if your motor ran for any time, it has got to the high-pressure pump and the fuel injectors.
You may see the engine running roughly, smoking, losing power, showing warning lights or cutting out, perhaps on the way back from Greena Moor Nature Reserve. or halfway across Canworthy. Pull over when it is safe. Switch off. Leave the car off instead of restarting it to check. Each start pulls more of that through.
Canworthy sits under 50 miles from the M5; if you were on it, exit at the next junction and pull up safely instead of carrying on.
Hopping across Canworthy to the car park by Maxworthy Methodist Church is one matter; heading towards Plymouth, under 50 miles away, is something else, because each mile pushes the AdBlue further in. So mileage matters. Roughly how far it had come is worth telling us.
Wherever the car came to a stop is where all of it gets done, even with more to rinse out once the engine has been started. Spotted quickly, it very seldom leaves lasting damage.
What does an AdBlue drain on a diesel involve in Canworthy?
The vehicle stays where it is, whether that is a road near Warbstow Community Centre, a drive, a lay-by or a filling station around Canworthy, and our van travels to it. What got in, about the quantity, plus whether the engine has been run: we ask first, since those decide the work.
Then that tank is cleared where your car sits, so the polluted fuel and the AdBlue come out together. With AdBlue, far more than with petrol, flushing matters: the fuel system is flushed right through since what remains won't flush out unaided. Clean diesel goes in after the filter is cleaned — or replaced, when it needs to be — and then your car is tested. About half an hour once we arrive is usual for most jobs when your engine hasn't run. The pumps are explosion-proof, safe on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark.
The final step is to bleed your system on clean diesel. You drive off as soon as we have started the engine, and it makes no difference whether your car is on a driveway around Canworthy or in a space at the nearest station. The test before we head off is that it runs properly on fresh diesel. The whole job is done where the car is, so it never has to be taken to a workshop. Afterwards, there is paperwork for the insurer: a VAT invoice plus a written report from the engineer.
About Canworthy, for a moment
Canworthy is a small hamlet situated in a riverside location in Cornwall, with Canworthy Water flowing nearby. Canworthy sits at an elevation of 134 metres, surrounded by rolling countryside and near the villages of Fonston and Caudworthy. Canworthy is characterized by its predominantly detached housing stock, reflecting its rural setting. Canworthy is located approximately 28 miles from Plymouth and 198 miles from London.
AdBlue drains across Cornwall, Canworthy included
Over the PL postcode area, the vans taking AdBlue jobs around Canworthy serve much of Cornwall as well, Canworthy Water, Fonston and Caudworthy included. Assuming won't help close to a border or anywhere hard to pin down; phone and ask.
No moving is needed. In Canworthy, a rural hamlet, a mobile service fits: your vehicle is drained where it stands, be it on a drive, a residential street, a car park or a forecourt.
Canworthy: what AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to fix
There's no honest single price, because the jobs aren't the same. Three things change the cost: whether the motor has run and for how long, how much AdBlue was put in, and where the vehicle is. That last one rests on whether a technician can reach it safely, and an open drive is simpler than a tight spot behind St Werburgh, Warbstow.
That's why each call from Canworthy starts with the same three queries, asked before giving a figure, not after: what got in, how much, and if it has run. Those replies turn a range into a straight quote.
Quoted on the call before the engineer heads out, the job is settled that day — card or phone, no deposit. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it is worth checking yours while we are on the way.
In Canworthy and still alongside the car?
Not touching your car is, then, the most useful thing open to you. Motor off, keys out, ignition off. Phone 0333 366 0103 and tell us it is AdBlue, roughly how much, and if it has run. Petrol in Diesel takes it from there, in Canworthy or anywhere across Cornwall.