Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Coombe
AdBlue in your diesel tank? Then keep your engine off — and the ignition as well. AdBlue is urea mixed in water. As it is water-based, it will not ignite and won't blend with diesel; trouble only comes once your pump starts drawing it. In Coombe, AdBlue in a diesel tank caught before your motor runs usually comes down to a drain and a thorough flush, just where the car is. Nothing comes before ringing 0333 366 0103.
Those opening minutes: AdBlue in the diesel tank in Coombe
To do:
- Remove the keys, which prevents someone turning the power on.
- If you're at all near moving traffic, put the hazards on.
- Keep the till receipt or the empty bottle, and so you can tell us what was put in and about how much.
- Give us a postcode starting BH19 3, or whatever street lies closest, and our van finds you directly — so call from wherever you are.
Not to do:
- Shifting the vehicle just a few yards is no reason to start your engine.
- Turning your key to ignition alone sets the pump going on plenty of diesels. Skip it.
- Don't top up with diesel to thin it. AdBlue does not mix in diesel; it separates out.
- Even a short way along Three Acre Lane is too far to drive the car.
- Emptying your tank yourself by the road isn't worth trying.
Rolling your vehicle away from the pumps is a job for staff to help with, whichever Coombe forecourt you are on, the Texaco or any other. Stopped on your own drive? Then it stays exactly where it is.
What does AdBlue do in a diesel tank?
The engine is not what AdBlue is made for; the exhaust is. Kept in a dedicated tank, it is injected into the exhaust stream to treat the fumes. Not one side suits the other: urea doesn't belong in a pump, and a pump can't deal with urea.
Inside a diesel tank it acts really differently from fuel. It doesn't mix in. Heavier than diesel, it drops and collects below it — the same spot the pickup draws from. Once the pump runs, the AdBlue is top of the list to be pulled through. Before then it waits beneath your diesel, which is how a car filled in Acton yesterday and never started stays the simple one, provided no one turns your key.
Once it is sucked in, the damage takes two forms. Crystals and corrosion. As the water dries, it leaves urea that crystallises in filter elements and narrow passages; and, because it eats at some metals, each part it touches keeps suffering for as long as it remains in there. A vehicle left standing in Coombe with AdBlue already in its lines is worse by the morning; one with AdBlue just in its tank is not. The water in it causes harm of its own: the high-pressure pump and the fuel injectors rely on diesel to lubricate them, and water gives them nothing.
Petrol or AdBlue in a diesel: why AdBlue is regularly worse
An issue of thin fuel is what you get from fuelling a diesel with petrol at the BP. It mixes with your diesel, and while it's inside your tank it causes no damage; the damage comes from running the motor on it.
AdBlue in a diesel is another matter: not thin fuel, yet no fuel at all. It does not burn, so it can't simply be run through. Whether the car sits in Ulwell or the centre of Coombe, turning it over "to see" does more harm in this case than almost any other slip, and the flush counts more. Why: it will not stay blended, so watering it down is impossible; and deposits and corrosion outlast the following tankful.
The good news is the same as with petrol. If your motor hasn't run, the AdBlue is still inside the tank, and the tank is the quickest part of a fuel system to clear, wherever in Dorset the car is standing.
Coombe: how AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank
After dark, two caps side by side — the AdBlue cap and the diesel cap, now and then behind a single flap — can appear the same. Nobody intends it; many designs invite it. It usually takes place outside the house, from a bottle grabbed en route home, not at the filling station.
A couple of familiar ways cover the majority of them. The top-up is hurried outside Swanage St Mark's Church of England Primary School, because the dash flashed with a warning while the kids were dropped off. Someone pours the container in at home, right off Valley Road, as the day ends. Else, in dim light by The Kings Arms, your car gets topped up by someone opening that flap for the first time.
The least known vehicles see it most — hire cars, new cars, fleet ones, and the spare motor in a family with one of each fuel types. Wherever around Dorset, Coombe as well, the slip doesn't change, and nor does the first response: keep it off.
Already started your engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank around Coombe?
Then the tank is no longer where the AdBlue is. It has been sucked through your filter and your lines, and if the engine ran for any time, it has got to the high-pressure fuel pump and the fuel injectors.
Watch for rough running, exhaust smoke, lost power, lights on the dash, or a cut-out — returning from Coombe Copse, perhaps, or part way across Coombe. Stop as soon as it is safe, switch off, and do not restart the car to check. Every start pulls more of that through.
Coombe sits under 50 miles from the M27; if you were on it, leave at the next junction and pull up safely instead of driving on.
Mileage counts: every mile carries the AdBlue further in, so heading for Southampton, under 50 miles away, makes a far larger job than hopping across Coombe to the car park by Putlake Adventure Farm. Tell us about how far it had come.
Wherever the vehicle came to a halt is where all of it gets done, even with more to flush after the motor has been run. Very rarely does it leave long-term damage when it's spotted soon.
What does an AdBlue drain on a diesel involve in Coombe?
A road by Langton Matravers Museum of the Stone Industry, a driveway, a lay-by or a forecourt: anywhere the vehicle has come to rest in Coombe, our engineers travel to it. Before anything else our technicians ask what went in, roughly how much, and if your motor has run, since those replies settle the work.
Next, draining that tank right there removes the polluted diesel and the AdBlue together. Your system is flushed thoroughly, which counts more with AdBlue than with petrol, since what it leaves behind does not rinse out on its own. The filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; fresh diesel goes in; and your car is tested. Engine not run? In that case expect roughly half an hour on site for most jobs. Low-noise enough to use outside a house at night, and safe on a working forecourt, our pumps are explosion-proof.
Priming your system with new diesel comes last. Then our engineers fire it up and you set off, whether from a parking bay at Poole or a driveway in Coombe. We confirm it runs properly on fresh diesel before leaving. The entire job is done where the car is, so it never needs to be taken to a garage. At the end, you are given the paperwork for your insurer: a VAT invoice plus a report from the engineer.
About Coombe itself
Coombe is a small suburban area situated on the coast of Dorset, with an elevation of around 45 metres. Coombe lies near the villages of Langton Matravers and Herston, and is part of the larger residential area surrounding Mount Pleasant. Coombe has a population of approximately 648 people, living in predominantly semi-detached housing. Coombe is located near the southern coast of England, within commuting distance of Southampton and around 102 miles from London.
AdBlue drains in Coombe and across Dorset
Our teams that answer AdBlue calls in Coombe also cover the spots round it, Langton Matravers, Mount Pleasant and Herston among them, and most of Dorset beyond, across the BH postcode area. If you're near a border, or somewhere hard to explain, ring and ask instead of assuming.
No towing is needed. In Coombe, a residential suburb, a van that comes to you works: the vehicle is drained where it stands, be it in a driveway, a side street, a car park or a forecourt.
What does AdBlue in a diesel tank cost to sort out around Coombe?
Each job is different, so not one single quote is honest. Whether the engine has been running, and for how long, comes first in what shifts the price. How much AdBlue got in comes next, and then the position of the car, since an open drive is easier for our van to get to safely than a tight spot behind St George.
What got in, what quantity, and if it ran: every Coombe enquiry begins by asking exactly that, before any figure, not afterwards. Those replies turn a range into a straight price.
You get that price on the phone, before anyone heads out, and you pay on the day, by card or by phone, with nothing upfront. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it's worth checking yours while we're on the way.
Still beside the vehicle around Coombe?
Then the most handy thing you can do is nothing to the car. Engine off, keys out, ignition off. Petrol in Diesel handles the rest, across Coombe or wherever within Dorset, after you call 0333 366 0103 saying it was AdBlue, about what quantity, and whether the engine ran.