Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Coldblow
AdBlue in your diesel tank? Then leave your motor off — and your ignition too. Water with urea dissolved in it: that's AdBlue. Being water-based, it will not burn and won't blend with diesel; trouble only comes when your pump begins pulling it. In Coldblow, AdBlue in a diesel tank caught before the motor runs normally means a drain and a thorough flush, just where your car is. Phone 0333 366 0103 before you do anything else.
Your next steps right now, Coldblow: AdBlue in the diesel tank
To do:
- Pocket your keys, and that prevents anyone switching the power on.
- Hazards on, if moving traffic is anywhere near.
- The empty bottle or your receipt tells us the fluid and the amount, and so don't throw it out.
- Our van finds you fastest with a postcode starting DA5 2, or simply the name of a street close by, so phone from the spot.
Things not to do:
- No starting the engine — not for a second, not to reposition your vehicle.
- Your ignition remains off: on lots of diesels, turning it on is enough to start the pump.
- Don't top up with diesel to dilute it. AdBlue doesn't mix in diesel; it separates out.
- Do not drive the vehicle anywhere, not even a short stretch along Dartford Road.
- No draining it yourself, at all, on the roadside.
Rolling the car away from the pumps is a job for staff to help with, whichever Coldblow forecourt you're on, the Murco or any other. Parked on your own driveway? Then it stays just as it is.
What AdBlue does in a diesel tank
AdBlue is made for your exhaust, not your engine. It goes into its own tank and is sprayed into your exhaust gas to clean it. No part in an injection pump is designed for this fluid — and none of that was meant to travel through one.
Fuel mixes; AdBlue, after poured in, won't. Its behaviour is not at all like diesel's. The pickup takes fuel from the deepest part of your tank, and that's precisely where AdBlue ends up: as it is heavier than diesel, it sinks. Easiest of all: one that got AdBlue in Old Bexley overnight and has not been started since. The AdBlue sits at the base of that tank, untouched — though it would be the first thing through once the engine starts, ahead of any diesel at all.
It does two kinds of damage from there. It attacks certain metals used in fuel systems, working on any part it touches until it is cleared from the system. And when the water evaporates, the urea turns into crystals that clog filters and lodge in narrow passages. Lines carrying AdBlue mean damage overnight for a vehicle sitting around Coldblow. Only inside your tank, it stays stable. The water in it does harm of its own: your high-pressure pump and the fuel injectors depend on diesel to lubricate them, and water gives them nothing.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel frequently the bigger issue?
A problem of thin fuel is what you end up with after fuelling a diesel with petrol at the Sainsbury's. Damage just comes from driving on it. Mixed into the diesel and left in the tank, it causes nothing.
The trouble with AdBlue in a diesel is a totally wrong substance. It does not burn, so it can't simply be run through. Nor can it be thinned, since it separates back out — and the following fill won't clear away crystals or corrosion. So the flush matters more with AdBlue, and turning the key "to see", in the heart of Coldblow or out in Bowmans, costs more than almost any other error.
The good news is the same as with petrol. If the motor hasn't run, the AdBlue is still in the tank, and that tank is the simplest part of a fuel system to clear, wherever across Greater London the vehicle is sitting.
AdBlue in a diesel tank around Coldblow: how it ends up there
Nobody means to do it. The AdBlue filler on many cars sits right next to your diesel filler, at times under the same flap, and the two caps can look alike in poor light. A container picked up while driving home and poured in at home, instead of at the filling station, is the usual story.
Mostly, it happens in one of a couple of familiar ways. The top-up is rushed outside Maypole Primary School, after the dash flashed with a warning while the children were taken in. After work, a bottle is tipped in on a drive close to St Marys Road. Or the car is topped up in the car park at Bexley Park Sports and Social Club, in poor light, by someone who has never opened that flap before.
The least familiar cars get it most — rentals, brand-new cars, company cars, and the other car of a family with both fuels. Wherever you are around Coldblow or the remainder of Greater London, it is the same mistake and the same first answer: leave it off.
AdBlue in your diesel tank around Coldblow, and the engine started?
Then that tank is no longer where the AdBlue is. It has been sucked through your filter and the fuel lines, and if your engine ran for any time, it has got to the high-pressure fuel pump and your injectors.
You may see the engine running roughly, smoking, losing power, showing warning lights or cutting out, perhaps on the way back from Norman's Wood or halfway across Coldblow. Stop as soon as it is safe, switch off, and do not restart the car to check. Each start pulls more of that through.
If you were on the M25, under 3 miles from Coldblow, come off at the next junction and stop somewhere safe rather than pressing on.
How far it went counts. A couple of hundred yards across Coldblow to the car park by Baldwyns Park Baptist Church is a very different job from a run towards London, under 15 miles away, with the AdBlue reaching further into your system with each mile. About how far it had come is worth telling us.
There's more to rinse out once the engine has been started, and our technicians do all of it where the car has stopped. When it is spotted quickly, lasting damage is very uncommon.
What clearing AdBlue from a diesel involves in Coldblow
Anywhere it has stopped in Coldblow — a forecourt, a lay-by, a driveway, a street beside St Barnabas — our van comes to your car. Which fluid was put in, about the quantity, plus if your engine has been run: we check before all else, because those decide the job.
Then the tank is cleared where your car waits, so the contaminated fuel and the AdBlue come out together. A full flush matters far more with AdBlue than after petrol, because what remains will not wash out on its own. After that, the fuel filter: cleaned, or replaced if it must be. Then fresh diesel, and then a check of the vehicle. Not run? In that case expect about half an hour once we are there for most jobs. Low-noise enough for use outside a house at night, and fine on a busy forecourt, our pumps are explosion-proof.
Priming the system with fresh diesel comes at the end. Then we start it and you head off, whether from a parking space outside Bexley or a drive in Coldblow. It is checked on clean diesel to confirm it runs properly before our engineers go. The entire job is done where the car is, so it never has to be taken to a garage. The insurer will want an engineer's report and the VAT invoice — both yours once the job is done.
About Coldblow, for a moment
Coldblow is a village in Greater London, situated approximately 13 miles from central London and 12 miles from the city of London. Coldblow has a relatively low elevation of 42 metres and is characterised by detached housing. Coldblow is near several other places, including Maypole, Bexley, and Joydens Wood, and has a population of around 1333 residents.
Coldblow and Greater London: AdBlue drains across the area
Throughout the DA postcode area, the vans answering AdBlue call-outs in Coldblow reach most of Greater London as well, Maypole, Bexley and Joydens Wood included. Near a boundary, or anywhere tricky to explain? Asking is better than assuming, and so ring.
Anywhere the car stands — your driveway at home, a residential street, a car park, a filling station — our technicians drain it on the spot, with no need to bring it to us; that suits Coldblow, a rural village, well.
Coldblow: what AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to fix
Because each callouts vary, a single price would not be fair. The price moves first with how long, if at all, your engine has been running, and next with the quantity of AdBlue that went in. After that it turns on where your car is and whether our van can get to it safely, which is easier on an open drive than in a tight spot behind St Mary the Virgin.
Ahead of a figure, never afterwards, every call from Coldblow begins with three checks: the fuel, the quantity, plus if it ran. Given those replies, a range narrows to one firm figure.
You get that quote on the phone, before anybody sets off, and you pay on the day, by card or by phone, with nothing upfront. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it's worth checking yours whilst we are on the way.
Coldblow: still alongside the vehicle?
Leaving your vehicle alone is, then, the most useful move you can do. Motor off, keys out, ignition off. Phone 0333 366 0103: AdBlue, roughly how much, plus whether the engine ran is everything our technicians need. Petrol in Diesel takes over the remainder throughout Greater London, Coldblow included.