AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Coslany? Don't Start It
If AdBlue has got into the diesel tank, keep your motor off then keep your ignition off. Chemically, AdBlue is just urea in water. It doesn't burn, it does not mix with diesel, and the damage it does starts when the system pulls it in. Caught before the motor has been run, AdBlue in a diesel tank is normally a drain and a thorough flush, done where your car is in Coslany. Before you do anything else, phone 0333 366 0103.
AdBlue in your diesel tank in Coslany: the first few minutes
Do:
- So no one can switch the ignition on, take your keys out.
- If you are at all close to moving traffic, put the hazards on.
- So you can give us which liquid it was and roughly what quantity, save the till receipt or the empty bottle.
- Our van finds you quickest with a postcode starting NR3 1, or simply the name of a street nearby, and so phone from the spot.
Do not:
- Not even for a second, and not to shift the vehicle: your motor stays off.
- Turning your key to ignition alone starts the pump running on many diesels. Avoid it.
- Pouring in extra diesel doesn't work: AdBlue separates out instead of thinning.
- Leave it where it is instead of driving it anywhere, even a short distance along Muspole Street.
- Beside the road, do not attempt emptying it yourself.
The attendants on duty at any Coslany forecourt — the Esso among them — will usually lend a hand pushing it aside if you ask. Stopped on your own drive? Then it remains exactly where it is.
What AdBlue does in a diesel tank
The engine isn't what AdBlue is made for; your exhaust is. Kept in a separate tank, it is injected into the exhaust stream to clean the fumes. Not one side fits the other: urea does not belong in an injection pump, and a pump can't take urea.
It does not blend. After it is poured into a tank of diesel, AdBlue acts not at all like fuel. It drops, because it is denser than diesel, and settles low where the intake draws its fuel from. A car topped up on a drive in Heigham Grove yesterday evening and not started since counts as the simple one. Nothing has pulled the AdBlue up yet — but when the motor runs, that is what goes first, directly from the bottom of that tank.
It causes two kinds of harm from there. As its water goes, the urea left behind crystallises, and the crystals block filters and settle in fine passages. And it is corrosive to some of the metals a fuel system is made from, and so it keeps running on the parts it gets to for as long as it stays there. By daybreak, a vehicle sitting around Coslany with AdBlue through its pipework gets worse; where it is just inside your tank, nothing changes. The water in it causes harm of its own: the high-pressure fuel pump and the injectors depend on diesel to lubricate them, and water offers them nothing.
Petrol or AdBlue in a diesel: why AdBlue is often worse
Petrol pumped into a diesel on JET's forecourt leaves your fuel thin — that's the main issue. Blended into your diesel and sitting still, it's harmless for now; using the engine does the harm.
With AdBlue in a diesel, the liquid as such is simply the wrong one. It does not burn, so it cannot simply be run through. Nor can it be watered down, because it separates back out — and the following fill won't rinse away deposits or corrosion. So the flush counts for more with AdBlue, and trying your engine "to see", in the heart of Coslany or out in Thorpe Hamlet, does more harm than almost any other error.
With AdBlue, the good news is no separate from petrol. Anywhere around Norfolk the car has come to rest, an unstarted engine leaves the AdBlue still inside the reservoir: the simplest bit of any fuel system to empty.
How AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank in Coslany
Plenty of motors put the AdBlue filler alongside the diesel one, now and then behind one flap, and after dark the two may look identical. Nobody intends it. Mostly it takes place with a bottle bought on the way home and poured in on the drive, not at the pump.
The ways it takes place are few and familiar. The top-up gets rushed outside Magdalen Gates Primary School, because the dash lit up with a warning while the kids were taken off. A bottle is poured in at the end of the day on a drive just off Duke Street. Or someone new to that flap refills your vehicle in dim light, stopped in the car park outside Weavers Arms.
The least familiar cars get it most — hire cars, brand-new cars, fleet cars, and the spare vehicle in a home with both fuel types. Wherever you are in Coslany or the remainder of Norfolk, it is the same slip and the same first answer: leave the car off.
Coslany: started your engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank?
Then the tank is no longer where the AdBlue is. With any running time, it travels to the high-pressure pump and every injector, after passing via the filter and lines.
Lumpy running, smoke, dropping power, dashboard warnings or cutting out: each may appear, maybe part way across Coslany or coming back from Gildencroft Park. No restarting to check: pull over when safe, then turn everything off. With each start, more of that is pulled through.
If you were on the M11, over 50 miles from Coslany, come off at the next junction and stop somewhere sensible rather than pressing on.
How far it went matters. A couple of hundred yards across Coslany to the car park by Norwich Central Baptist Church is a very different job from a run towards Norwich, under a mile away, with the AdBlue reaching further into the fuel system with each mile. Let us know about how far it had come.
We do all of the flushing where your car has ended up, and once the motor has run there is more of it. Spotted quickly, it very rarely leaves lasting damage.
What does an AdBlue drain on a diesel involve in Coslany?
We come to the vehicle, wherever it has stopped around Coslany: a side street near Saint Mary Coslany, a drive, a lay-by or a forecourt. Which fluid went in, about the quantity, plus if your engine has been run: our technicians ask first, because those shape the work.
On the spot, that tank is then emptied, and all of the polluted diesel and the urea come out at once. With AdBlue, far more than with petrol, flushing counts: the fuel system is flushed all the way through since residue will not flush away by itself. After that, the fuel filter: flushed, or replaced when it has to be. Then fresh diesel, and then a check of your vehicle. Roughly half an hour on site is typical for most jobs when your engine hasn't run. The pumping gear is explosion-proof, so a busy forecourt is no problem, and it's quiet enough for a residential street after dark.
Finally, your system is bled with new diesel. Starting it comes next, and then you drive off from where your car is parked, outside Norwich or on a driveway in Coslany. We check it runs smoothly on new diesel before we leave. Our technicians do it all wherever the car has stopped, and it never has to go to a workshop. You get a VAT invoice and an engineer report later, which is what insurers want.
About Coslany itself
Coslany is a suburban area located on the riverside in Norfolk, with a low elevation of around 8 metres. Coslany sits adjacent to the city of Norwich, with which it is closely tied, and is near other local areas such as The Close and Chapelfield Grove. Coslany is characterized by a high proportion of flat housing, reflecting its urban setting. Coslany is also relatively close to London, at a distance of approximately 98.5 miles.
AdBlue drains across Norfolk, Coslany included
The Close, Norwich and Chapelfield Grove are among the places near Coslany that the same teams reach, together with much of Norfolk beyond, throughout the NR postcode area. If you are near a boundary, or somewhere hard to describe, ring and ask rather than assuming.
No moving is needed. In Coslany, a residential suburb, a mobile service works: your vehicle is drained where it stands, whether on a drive, a residential street, a car park or a forecourt.
AdBlue in a diesel tank around Coslany: the cost of fixing it
There is no honest single price, because the jobs are not the same. Whether the engine has run, and for how long, comes first in what shifts the price. How much AdBlue went in comes next, and then the position of the vehicle, since an open drive is easier for our van to get to safely than a tight space behind St Marys Works.
That's why each call from Coslany starts with the same three queries, asked before giving a figure, not after: what got in, how much, and whether it's run. With those replies, the range shrinks to one firm figure.
The price is quoted during the call, before a van sets off; settling up comes on the day, by card or over the phone, with nothing upfront. Check your insurance whilst we are on the way: many include misfuelling cover.
Still next to the car in Coslany?
Right now, the most helpful thing to do with the vehicle is to not touch it. Ignition off, engine off, keys out. Ring 0333 366 0103 and tell us it is AdBlue, about how much, and whether it has run. Petrol in Diesel takes it from there, around Coslany or anywhere across Norfolk.