AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Chobham: Why It Occurs and How to Stop It
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave the motor and the ignition off then ring 0333 366 0103. Usually, if your motor hasn't turned, it's emptied and thoroughly cleaned where your car is in Chobham. If you're reading before it has happened, the remainder of this page is about why it occurs and how to make sure it does not.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel car need its own filler?
Not one fluid but two: that is how many modern diesels near Chobham and Mimbridge run, with diesel feeding the engine. Stored in a tank of its own, AdBlue is sprayed into your exhaust gas and cleans it.
Each tank has its own filler. Under one flap, side by side: that is the arrangement on many cars. On others, AdBlue's filler sits under the bonnet or in your boot instead. At the pump, your diesel side is topped up constantly. Rarely topped up, AdBlue usually goes in out of a bottle, tipped by a driver who must stop and think what cap it needs. It's in that gap that the slip lives.
Chobham: how AdBlue in your diesel tank occurs
Seldom is it carelessness: usually three things coincide.
To start with, the warning. Low AdBlue triggers a warning from your car, and running out leads to limp mode — hence a rushed top-up, maybe before work off High Street, perhaps at The White Hart on the way home that evening.
New-to-you vehicles come next, as well. Hire cars, new cars and company vehicles place their fillers differently, and the hand goes for the cap used on the old one.
And the bottle fits. A bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one, so nothing stops the tip once it has started. Whether it takes place in Burrowhill or the middle of Chobham, it is the same few seconds.
Which filler is for AdBlue, and which for diesel?
Before you tip anything, whether on a drive in Brook Place or a forecourt around Chobham, check these. They take a couple of seconds.
- Check the cap rather than going by position: AdBlue caps are commonly blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel ones normally aren't.
- The size. On plenty of motors the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- A label inside your fuel flap frequently says which fuel goes where, on plenty of vehicles. Check for it.
- In the boot or under the bonnet: that is where the filler sits if it's not by the diesel cap, and the handbook tells you which.
- The person who drove it last. On a hire or company car collected from somewhere like the car park at Longcross, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
Keeping AdBlue out of your diesel tank when you top up
The day the light goes on, wherever across Surrey, use this routine.
- Turn off after you park — level ground, motor off, and not in a rush beside Bagshot Road at the roadside.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, after finding the AdBlue filler and reading it. Daft, perhaps, yet it works.
- Both under one flap? So make sure the cap on your diesel side is still closed before raising the bottle.
- Using the bottle's own spout, pour slowly — and stop when it is full or the bottle is empty.
- Close the cap, then look once more — making sure the diesel filler stayed shut throughout. After that, start your car.
Find at stage two or three that it's already gone into your diesel side? So stop right there. Do not go on to step five.
Chobham: already put AdBlue in the diesel tank?
Don't start your engine: that is where the short order of things begins. Do not switch your ignition on; on plenty of diesels that alone runs the fuel pump. Don't top up with diesel to dilute it: AdBlue does not mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of that tank, where your fuel is pulled from.
At a forecourt — Esso, BP or any other — the staff will usually help push your car away, if you ask. On your own drive in Chobham? So the vehicle remains where it is.
Stop as soon as it is safe and switch off, if the engine has already run. Leave the M3 — under 3 miles out of Chobham — at the first junction. Distance counts — a short hop across Chobham is a smaller job than heading under 25 miles towards Westminster — so say roughly how far it went.
Chobham: what happens when we get there
Our technicians come to the car wherever it has stopped, whether that's outside St Lawrence CofE Primary School, near Chobham Village Sign or on your own driveway. Which liquid was put in, the amount, and whether it ran: our technicians ask because those replies set the work and quote. The price is given on the call, ahead of any van leaving.
After that: a drain, then a thorough flush of the whole system. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, and so it doesn't wash out on its own — which is why the flush matters more here than with petrol. A test comes last: before that, fresh diesel is added, and your filter is flushed or replaced if necessary. Next we start it and check it runs smoothly before we go.
Most jobs are done in about half an hour after our engineers get there, provided your engine hasn't run — and the pumps our engineers use are safe on a busy forecourt yet quiet at night beside a house. Payment is on the day, not upfront, and you are given the paperwork an insurer asks for: an engineer report and a VAT invoice. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it is worth checking yours while we are on the way.
About Chobham and where it is
Chobham is a village in Surrey, situated on the banks of the River Bourne at an elevation of around 30 metres. Chobham lies approximately 23 miles southwest of central London, near the neighbouring communities of Burrowhill, Castle Green, and Penny Pot. Chobham has a population of around 890 residents, predominantly living in detached homes. Chobham is characterized by its riverside setting and surrounding countryside.
AdBlue drains about Chobham, and Surrey beyond
Castle Green and Penny Pot are among the towns around Chobham, a village, that the same vans cover, throughout GU postcodes. Quote a postcode beginning GU24 8, and our van arrives fastest.
The vehicle doesn't need to move. A drive, a lay-by on the way to Chobham Cricket Club, a side street near Chobham Cannon: our technicians drain it where it stands. Awkward to explain, like the back of Chobham Museum? By a border? Checking is better than assuming, so phone.
The short version for Chobham motorists
Before you tip, read the cap. Still AdBlue in the diesel tank? Petrol in Diesel will empty it wherever it is, anywhere in Surrey: keep the car off then ring 0333 366 0103.