Preventing AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Cippenham: Why It Occurs
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave the engine and the ignition off then ring 0333 366 0103. Normally, if your motor has not run, it's emptied and fully cleaned where the car is around Cippenham. Nothing happened yet? Below, the rest of the page explains the reasons it happens and the ways to prevent it altogether.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle, and its separate tank
No single liquid but two: that's what plenty of modern diesels near Cippenham and Chalvey run, with diesel feeding the motor. Kept in a tank of its own, AdBlue is fed into the exhaust stream to clean it.
Different tanks, different fillers. Under one flap, side by side: that is the layout on a lot of cars. On others, AdBlue's filler sits under the bonnet or in the boot instead. The diesel side is fuelled at the pump all the time. A driver who has to stop and work out where it goes normally tops up the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and much less commonly. The mistake lives in that gap.
How AdBlue in your diesel tank occurs in Cippenham
Three things tend to come together, and carelessness is rarely one of them.
Haste follows from the warning. Your car tells you as AdBlue runs low, and an empty tank sends it into limp mode — so the top-up gets done quickly, before work on a drive off Lower Cippenham Lane, or on the way home in the car park outside Kings Head.
Unfamiliar motors come second, as well. Rentals, new vehicles and company motors put their fillers differently, and the hand goes for the cap it used on the old one.
A spouted bottle meets no obstacle at a diesel filler no more than at an AdBlue one. And so the pour, once begun, carries on. Salt Hill or the heart of Cippenham: it takes the same few seconds in both.
Telling the AdBlue filler from the diesel filler
Look at these before pouring, at a forecourt in Cippenham or a drive out in Lake End. Seconds, no more.
- Blue and lettering: an AdBlue cap is often blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap normally does not. Go by the cap, not where it sits.
- Many vehicles fit AdBlue the smaller filler of the two.
- The flap. Look inside the fuel flap for a label. Plenty of cars say there which fuel goes where.
- In the boot or under the bonnet: that's where your filler sits if it's not by your diesel cap, and the handbook says which.
- Check with the person who drove it last — before you leave, not when the light comes on — when you collect a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park at Burnham.
Keeping AdBlue out of the diesel tank when you top up
The day the light goes on, anywhere across Berkshire, use this routine.
- Park and switch off. Not on a slope, not with the motor running, and not in a rush on the side of Spring Lane.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds silly and it works.
- The two behind a single flap? Then confirm the lid on your diesel side is still shut before lifting the bottle.
- Pour slowly, using the bottle's own spout. Stop when it's full or when the bottle is empty.
- Before you start your car, shut the cap and look again that your diesel cap never opened off.
Discover at the second or third step that the bottle went into the diesel filler? That is where you stop. Skip stage five altogether.
Cippenham: already put AdBlue in your diesel tank?
Then the order of things is short. Do not start the motor. Do not switch the ignition on; on plenty of diesels that alone runs the fuel pump. Filling up with diesel will not dilute it: instead, AdBlue sinks to the bottom of your tank, just where the fuel is taken from.
Ask the attendants to help roll the car clear of the petrol pump if you're at a forecourt — the JET, the Esso or somewhere else. If you are on your own driveway around Cippenham, leave it where it sits.
Where your motor has been run already, stop safely then switch it off. The next exit means where to come off if you are on the M4, under a mile from Cippenham. About how far did it go? Hopping across Cippenham is less a job than a trip of under 25 miles towards St Albans, and so say.
What happens when we turn up around Cippenham
Our technicians come to your car wherever it has stopped, whether that is outside Western House Academy, near Marks & Spencer or on your own driveway. Those answers decide the work and the quote, so our technicians ask what was put in, roughly how much, and if it has run. You hear that quote on the phone, before anybody heads out.
Then the tank is emptied and the fuel system rinsed thoroughly. With AdBlue that counts more than with petrol: it crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it doesn't wash out on its own. The filter cleaned or, if it must be, replaced; fresh diesel in; then a test of your car. Your engine is fired up next and checked to make sure it runs correctly, all before we go.
Unrun cars usually need a half-hour visit after the moment we arrive. The kit is fine on a live filling station, and hushed enough for a residential street after dark. Nothing upfront; you settle up on the day. Afterwards, the VAT invoice and the report from the engineer go to you for your insurer. While we travel, have a look at your insurance documents; plenty include cover for misfuelling.
About Cippenham
Cippenham is a suburban area in Berkshire, situated inland at an elevation of 24 metres, and is located approximately 21.8 miles west of London. Cippenham is characterized by its predominantly terraced housing and is near to other local places such as Salt Hill, Eton Wick, and Britwell. Cippenham has a population of around 10458 residents and is close to the nearby city of St Albans, which is 20.7 miles away.
AdBlue drains about Cippenham, and Berkshire beyond
Cippenham is a residential suburb, and the vans that cover it also work the places near it, Eton Wick and Britwell among them, across the SL postcode area. Fastest of all: give a SL1 5 postcode for the van.
Your car doesn't need to move. Anywhere it sits — near Guru Maneyo Granth Gurdwara, in a layby heading to Cippenham Village Green, on a drive — that is where it is emptied. Tricky to pin down, like the back of Cippenham Moat? Close to a county line? Asking beats assuming, and so ring.
In short, for Cippenham motorists
Before you tip, read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank regardless, leave the car off then ring 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel clears it where it stands, anywhere around Berkshire.