AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Crag Bank: How It Happens and How to Avoid It
AdBlue already in the diesel tank? Then set this page down for now, keep the ignition and engine off, and ring 0333 366 0103. Caught before your engine runs, it is normally a drain and a thorough flush, done where the vehicle is around Crag Bank. If you are reading before it has happened, the remainder of this page is about why it occurs and how to make sure it does not.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel motor need its own filler?
Plenty of current diesels on the roads about Crag Bank and Bolton-le-Sands carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to the engine. Your exhaust, not the engine, is where AdBlue ends up: sprayed into the fumes to fresh it, from a separate tank.
Every tank comes with one filler of its own. Many of motors have a single flap for both, whereas some put the AdBlue filler to your boot or under the bonnet. Filling the diesel side at the petrol pump happens all the time. Far less commonly, the AdBlue side is filled — mostly from a bottle, by a person working out where it goes. That gap is where the slip lives.
AdBlue in the diesel tank around Crag Bank: how it happens
It is hardly ever carelessness. Three things tend to line up.
First, the warning. Low AdBlue brings a message from the car, and running out leads to limp mode — hence a rushed top-up, maybe before work off Crag Bank Crescent, or outside The Canal Turn on the way home that evening.
Then the vehicle is strange. A hire car, a new motor or a company car puts the fillers where your last one did not, and your hand gets to for the cap it would have used on the old one.
A spout-topped bottle finds no obstacle at a diesel filler any more than at an AdBlue one. And so the pour, once started, keeps on. Whether it happens in Carnforth or the middle of Crag Bank, it's the same few seconds.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Before you pour anything, whether on a driveway in Bolton Town End or a forecourt in Crag Bank, check these. They take a few seconds.
- The cap. The AdBlue cap is regularly blue, or marked "AdBlue". Your diesel cap normally isn't. Read it rather than going by where it sits.
- The size. On many motors the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Many motors say there which fuel goes where.
- The handbook. If your filler isn't by your diesel cap, it's in the boot or under the bonnet, 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 outside Carnforth.
How to top up without AdBlue in the diesel tank
Wherever across Lancashire the light comes on, here is a routine for the day.
- Park and switch off. Not on a slope, not with the engine running, and not in a rush on the side of Crag Bank Road.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, once you find the AdBlue filler and read it. Silly, perhaps, yet it does the trick.
- The diesel cap remains on. When the two share a flap, make sure it's closed before lifting the bottle.
- Using the bottle's own spout, pour slowly — and stop when it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Close the cap and check once more. Make sure the diesel cap was never opened. Only then start the car.
Stop there if you find, at stage two or three, that you have already poured into your diesel side. Never carry on to stage five.
Already put AdBlue in the diesel tank around Crag Bank?
What follows is a short order of things, beginning with not starting your motor. Leave the ignition off as well, since on plenty of diesels it by itself runs your pump. AdBlue does not mix with diesel — it sinks to the bottom of that tank, where your fuel is drawn from — so don't top up with diesel to thin it.
At a forecourt — Esso, Logs Direct or another — the staff will normally help push your car clear, if you ask. On your own drive in Crag Bank? Then the car stays put.
If the engine has already run, stop as soon as it is safe and switch off. The next exit is the place to leave if you are on the M6, under a mile from Crag Bank. Roughly how far did it go? Crossing Crag Bank is less a job than a run of under 10 miles to Lancaster, and so say.
Our arrival in Crag Bank, and what takes place next
Wherever the car has stopped, whether by Carnforth Community Primary School, beside Crag Bank Village Hall or on your own drive, the van travels to it. Which fluid went in, the quantity, and if it ran: our technicians ask since the replies set the work and quote. Nobody sets off before you've had the price over the phone.
Next: draining, then a thorough flush of the entire system. Much more than with petrol, it matters here: crystals build up, certain metals corrode, and none of that clears out on its own, however long it sits. Once your filter has been cleaned — or renewed, where required — clean diesel goes in, and finally your car is tested. Your engine is fired up next and tested to make sure it runs properly, all before we head off.
If your motor has not run, most jobs take about half an hour once we're there, using pumps that are safe on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark. Your insurer usually wants the engineer's report and the VAT invoice, and you get both once the job is done. Payment is on the day, with no deposit. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it is worth checking yours while we're on the way.
About Crag Bank itself
Crag Bank is a small suburban area situated near the coast in Lancashire, with an elevation of 21 metres above sea level. Crag Bank lies approximately 5 miles from Lancaster and is close to nearby places such as Carnforth and Nether Kellet. Crag Bank has a population of around 2416 people and predominantly features terraced housing. Crag Bank is located in the North West region of England, about 211.8 miles from London.
AdBlue drains across Lancashire, Crag Bank included
Over LA postcodes, the teams that cover Crag Bank — a residential suburb — work the nearby spots too, Nether Kellet and Millhead among them. A postcode starting LA5 9 gets the van to you fastest.
Shifting the car isn't necessary. Wherever it sits — near Carnforth Rangers FC, in a lay-by heading to Crag Bank Park, at home — that is where it gets emptied. Ring and ask instead of guessing if you're near a border, or somewhere hard to describe, like the back of County Library.
In short, for Crag Bank people
Pour nothing until you have read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank all the same, leave it off then call 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it waits, anywhere around Lancashire.