AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Cob Wall: How It Happens and How to Prevent 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. Caught before your engine runs, it's normally a drain and a thorough flush, done where the car is in Cob Wall. Here before the event? In that case what follows explains how it comes about and what to prevent it ever happening.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel motor
Plenty of current diesels on the roads about Cob Wall and Green Bank carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to your motor. Its own tank holds it, and from there it goes to your exhaust, where spraying cleans the gas.
There is a filler for every tank. Plenty of motors have a single flap for the two, while others move the AdBlue filler to your boot or under the bonnet. At the pump, your diesel side is topped up all the time. Someone who has to stop and think where it goes normally fills the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and far less often. It is in that gap that the error lives.
Cob Wall: how AdBlue in your diesel tank occurs
Rarely is it carelessness: normally three things coincide.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low the vehicle tells you, and if it runs out altogether, the car goes into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a drive off Goldhey Street before work, or in the car park at The Farthings on the way home.
Then the car is new. A hire car, a new motor or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't, and the hand hits for the cap it would have used on the old one.
A spouted bottle finds no resistance at a diesel filler no more than at an AdBlue one. So the tip, after begun, keeps on. Daisyfield or the middle of Cob Wall: it takes the same few seconds either way.
Which filler is for AdBlue, and which for diesel?
Whether a Cob Wall forecourt or a driveway over in Brookhouse, take a couple of seconds over these before any is poured in.
- Colour and lettering: an AdBlue cap is commonly blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap usually does not. Trust the cap, not where it sits.
- The size. On plenty of vehicles the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- A label inside the fuel flap frequently says which fuel goes where, on many vehicles. Look for it.
- In your boot or under the bonnet: that's where the filler sits if it's not by the diesel cap, and the handbook says which.
- Collecting a hire or company car, perhaps at the car park at Blackburn? Ask the person who drove it last before you set off, not once the light comes on.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach your diesel tank
Wherever around Lancashire the light comes on, here is a routine for that day.
- Park and switch off. Not on a slope, not with your motor running, and not in a rush on the side of Beechwood Road.
- Daft as it sounds, saying "AdBlue" aloud while you unscrew the cap works — once you've found your filler and read the cap.
- Leave your diesel cap on. If both sit under one flap, check the diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle.
- Tip slowly, using the bottle's own spout. Stop when it's full or when the bottle is empty.
- Shut the cap, and check again — confirm your diesel cap stayed shut the whole time. Only then, start your car.
Spot at stage two or three that it's already gone into your diesel side? Then stop just there. Never carry on to step five.
AdBlue in the diesel tank already, around Cob Wall?
Do not start the motor: that's where the short order of things begins. On many diesels the ignition alone runs the fuel pump, so do not switch it on. Do not top up with diesel to thin it: AdBlue doesn't mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of the tank, where the fuel is sucked from.
The staff at Tesco, Shell or another forecourt will usually help to push your car away if asked. Your own driveway in Cob Wall is the place it should stay.
Stop as soon as it is safe and switch off, if your motor has already run. On the M65, under a mile from Cob Wall, that means the next exit. Mileage matters — a quick hop across Cob Wall is a smaller job than driving under 10 miles to Preston — so say roughly how far it went.
When our technicians arrive in Cob Wall, what occurs?
Wherever your car has stopped, whether outside Daisyfield Primary School, near St Stephen or on your own drive, the van travels to it. Those replies decide the work and our quote, and so we ask what went in, roughly how much, and whether it's run. The price comes on the call, before any van leaves.
Draining the tank comes next, followed by a full flush of the fuel system. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, and so it does not wash out on its own — which is why the flush matters more with AdBlue than with petrol. Once the filter has been cleaned — or replaced, if required — fresh diesel is added, and then your vehicle gets tested. Before we leave, our engineers start the car and check that it is running properly.
If your engine has not run, the majority of jobs take about half an hour once we are there, using pumps that are safe on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark. You pay on the day, with nothing upfront, and get a VAT invoice and an engineer report for your insurer. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it's worth checking yours whilst we're on the way.
About Cob Wall itself
Cob Wall is a suburban area situated on the riverside in Lancashire, with a mix of terraced housing and local amenities. Cob Wall sits at an elevation of 122 metres, approximately 9.5 miles from Preston and 183.7 miles from London. Cob Wall forms part of the wider urban area around Preston, with nearby neighbourhoods including Daisyfield, Bastwell, and Little Harwood.
Cob Wall and Lancashire: AdBlue drains across the area
Throughout BB postcodes, our vans covering Cob Wall — a residential suburb — work the nearby locations too, Little Harwood and Bastwell among them. Quickest of all: quote a BB1 5 postcode for our van.
Your car remains put. The drain takes place right there, be it a drive, a street near Khanqah, or a lay-by towards Woolridge Playing Fields. If you are close to a border, or somewhere hard to explain like the back of St Michael & All Angels Worship Centre, ring and ask rather than assuming.
In short, for Cob Wall people
Read the cap before you tip. If AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank regardless, leave the vehicle off and ring 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel clears it where it sits, anywhere in Lancashire.