Preventing AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Chorleywood Bottom: Why It Happens
Keep the engine and ignition off and phone 0333 366 0103 first — reading can wait when AdBlue is already in your diesel tank. A drain plus a thorough flush, carried out just where the vehicle stands in Chorleywood Bottom, is normally what it takes if found before the engine runs. The rest of this page covers why it happens and how to make sure it doesn't — useful if you're reading ahead of time.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle: two tanks, two fillers
Plenty of modern diesels on the roads round Chorleywood Bottom and Heronsgate carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to the motor. AdBlue's own tank holds it, and from there it is sent to your exhaust, where a spray treats the fumes.
Each tank has its own filler. On a lot of motors the two sit side by side under the same flap; on others the AdBlue filler is in your boot or under the bonnet. Diesel goes in at every forecourt call-out, again and again. Seldom topped up, AdBlue normally goes in from a bottle, tipped by someone who has to stop and think what cap to use. The slip lives in that gap.
How does AdBlue in your diesel tank occur around Chorleywood Bottom?
Rarely is it carelessness: normally three things line up.
On a driveway off Chorleywood Bottom before work, or in the car park outside The Old Shepherd heading home: that's where the rushed top-up happens. Why the rush? As AdBlue gets low your car tells you, and if it's gone, limp mode kicks in.
Then your car is unfamiliar. A hire car, a new car or a company car puts the fillers where your last one did not, and the hand hits for the cap it would have 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. It takes a few seconds, whether out in Chorleywood or right in the centre of Chorleywood Bottom.
The AdBlue filler and your diesel filler: telling them apart
Check these first, at a forecourt in Chorleywood Bottom or a driveway over in Mill End. A few seconds, no more.
- Read the cap rather than going by position: AdBlue ones are regularly blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel ones usually aren't.
- On many motors, size gives it away: AdBlue has the smaller filler neck.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Plenty of motors say there which fuel goes where.
- Cannot see it beside the diesel inlet? In that case look beneath the bonnet or in the boot — the owner's manual will say where.
- Check with the person who drove it last — before you leave, not when the light comes on — if you pick up a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park at Chorleywood.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach your diesel tank
When the light goes on, anywhere around Hertfordshire, follow this routine.
- Not in a rush on the side of Turneys Orchard, not on a slope, not with your motor running: park then switch off first.
- Find the AdBlue filler, check the cap, and speak the word "AdBlue" aloud as unscrewing it. It seems silly. It does the trick.
- If both sit under one flap, check your diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — then leave it on.
- Pour slowly, using the bottle's own spout. Stop when it's full or when the bottle is empty.
- Before you start your car, close the cap and check a second time that the diesel cap was never came off.
Discover at the second or third step that AdBlue went in the wrong filler? That's where you stop. Step five stays out.
AdBlue in your diesel tank already, in Chorleywood Bottom?
The short order of things, starting with not starting your engine. On plenty of diesels the ignition alone runs the fuel pump, and so don't switch the car on. Diluting it with more diesel won't work, because AdBlue settles to the base rather than mixing — and that is where your fuel is sucked from.
Ask the staff to help roll the car away from the pump if you are at a forecourt — the Shell, the BP or somewhere else. Your own driveway around Chorleywood Bottom is where it should stay.
If your motor has already run, stop as soon as it is safe then switch off. The next exit means where to come off when you're on the M25, under a mile from Chorleywood Bottom. About how far did it go? Hopping across Chorleywood Bottom is less a job than a trip of under 15 miles to St Albans, so say.
Our arrival in Chorleywood Bottom, and what happens next
Wherever the car came to rest, whether outside Chorleywood Primary School, near The Bridge or at home, the van comes to it. Our engineers ask what went in, roughly how much, and whether it's run, since those answers decide the work and our price. During the phone call itself, you are told the price — before dispatch.
Emptying your tank comes next, followed by a full flush of your 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 that counts more with AdBlue than with petrol. Filter flushed or, if needed, replaced; fresh diesel in; then a test of your car. Before we go, our technicians start it and make sure that it's running correctly.
Most jobs are done in roughly half an hour after our engineers arrive, as long as your engine hasn't run — and the pumps our technicians use are fine on a busy forecourt yet quiet at night outside a house. No money in advance; you settle up that day. Afterwards, the VAT invoice and the report from the engineer go to you for the insurer. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it's worth checking yours whilst we are on the way.
About Chorleywood Bottom itself
Chorleywood Bottom is a suburban area in Hertfordshire, situated inland at an elevation of 79 metres, approximately 19.4 miles from London. Chorleywood Bottom is characterised by its predominantly detached housing stock, reflecting the affluence of the surrounding area. Chorleywood Bottom sits near the larger settlement of Chorleywood, with which it is closely associated, and is also close to The Swillett and Chorleywood West.
Chorleywood Bottom and Hertfordshire: AdBlue drains across the area
The Swillett and Chorleywood West are among the towns around Chorleywood Bottom, a residential suburb, that the same teams cover, throughout WD postcodes. A postcode starting WD3 5 gets our van to you fastest.
There's no need to shift your car. Wherever it stands — beside Saint Andrews Church, on a layby en route to Waring's Field, at home — that's where it is emptied. If you're close to a border, or somewhere hard to describe like the back of Chorleywood Community Library, ring and ask rather than assuming.
In short, for Chorleywood Bottom drivers
Read the cap before you tip. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it stands, anywhere in Hertfordshire, if AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank regardless — and so leave the vehicle off then phone 0333 366 0103.