Why It Happens and How to Avoid It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Dagenham
Pause reading a minute if your diesel tank already has AdBlue in it: ignition off, engine off, and phone 0333 366 0103. Normally, if the motor hasn't turned, it's emptied and thoroughly flushed where the car is in Dagenham. Nothing happened yet? Below, the page explains the why it takes place and the how to prevent it for good.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel motor
Diesel goes to the engine — yet plenty of newer diesels seen about Dagenham and Rush Green carry another liquid too. Your exhaust, not the motor, is where AdBlue goes: dosed into the fumes to fresh it, from its own tank.
Each tank comes with a filler of its own. Under one flap, next to each other: that is the layout on a lot of cars. Elsewhere, AdBlue's filler is beneath the bonnet or in your boot instead. Topping up the diesel side at the pump goes on constantly. The AdBlue side is fuelled far less often, normally from a bottle, and usually by a person who has to stop and think where it goes. The mistake lives in that gap.
How AdBlue in the diesel tank occurs in Dagenham
Three things tend to come together, and carelessness is seldom one of them.
Haste comes from the warning. The vehicle warns you as AdBlue runs low, and an empty tank sends it into limp mode — so the top-up happens quickly, before work on a drive off Manor Road, or on the way home in the car park at The Cross Keys.
Unfamiliar cars come second, as well. Hire cars, new motors and company vehicles put their fillers differently, and habit reaches for the cap it used on the old one.
Nothing halts the tip after it has started, because a bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as readily as an AdBlue one. The bottle fits. The same few seconds decide it, in the middle of Dagenham or out in South Hornchurch.
Telling the AdBlue filler from the diesel filler
Before you pour anything, whether on a drive in Rainham or a forecourt in Dagenham, check these. They take a couple of seconds.
- Check the cap instead of going by where it sits: AdBlue caps are regularly blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel caps normally aren't.
- Look at the size: the smaller filler neck is, on plenty of motors, the AdBlue one.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Many vehicles say there which fuel goes where.
- In your boot or under the bonnet: that is where your filler is if it is not by the diesel cap, and the handbook says which.
- The person who drove the vehicle last. On a hire or company car collected from somewhere like the car park outside Dagenham Dock, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
Keeping AdBlue out of your diesel tank when you top up
For the day the warning appears — wherever it is in Greater London — a routine to follow.
- Pull in on level, motor off, with time in hand — not rushing on the side of Crown Street.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds daft and it works.
- The two under a single flap? So confirm the cap on the diesel side stays closed before lifting the bottle.
- Gently does it, through the bottle's own spout, until it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Only after that, start your car: close the cap, check again, and make sure your diesel cap was never opened.
Spot at stage two or three that it has already gone into your diesel side? So stop just there. Don't go on to step five.
Dagenham: already put AdBlue in the diesel tank?
What follows is a short order of things, starting with no starting your motor. Don't switch the ignition on; on plenty of diesels that alone runs the fuel pump. Don't top up with diesel to dilute it: AdBlue does not mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of that tank, where your fuel is pulled from.
Ask the staff to help push the car clear of the petrol pump if you're at a forecourt — the Esso, the Shell or somewhere else. Your own driveway around Dagenham is where it should stay.
Where your motor has been run by now, stop somewhere safe and turn it off. On the M25, under 5 miles from Dagenham, that means the next exit. A short hop across Dagenham is a smaller job than a run towards London, under 15 miles away, so tell us roughly how far it went.
What occurs when our technicians get there in Dagenham
By John Perry Primary School, close to Old Dagenham Methodist Church or on your own driveway: wherever the car has stopped, our technicians come to it. Our engineers ask what went in, roughly how much, and if it has run, because the answers determine the work and our price. You hear that quote by phone, before anybody heads out.
After that: a drain, then a thorough flush of the entire system. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it doesn't wash out on its own — which is why that matters more here than with petrol. The filter flushed or, where it must be, replaced; fresh diesel in; then a test of the vehicle. We do not go until it has been fired up and is running smoothly.
If your engine has not run, most jobs take about half an hour once we are there, using pumps that are safe on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark. The insurer usually wants the engineer's report and your VAT invoice, and you get both once this job is done. Payment is on the day, with no money upfront. It's worth looking at your insurance while we travel to you: misfuelling cover comes with plenty of policies.
About Dagenham, briefly
Dagenham is a locality in east London, situated on the north bank of the River Thames at an elevation of around 6 metres. Dagenham lies approximately 12 miles from central London and is surrounded by other suburban areas, including South Hornchurch, Becontree, and Elm Park. Dagenham has a population of around 6441 people, predominantly residing in flat-type housing. Dagenham is characterized by its riverside setting and relatively low elevation, making it prone to flooding in extreme weather conditions.
Dagenham and Greater London: AdBlue drains across the area
Dagenham is a small village, and our vans that cover it also work the places near it, Becontree and Elm Park among them, across the RM postcode area. The van reaches you fastest with a postcode starting RM10 8.
Moving the car isn't necessary. Our technicians drain it where it is — a side street near Bereavement Centre, a lay-by on the way to Dagenham Village Churchyard, a driveway. If you are close to a boundary, or somewhere hard to explain like the back of Dagenham Parish Church of SS Peter & Paul, ring and ask instead of guessing.
For Dagenham motorists, the short version
Read the cap before you tip. Still AdBlue in the diesel tank? Petrol in Diesel will empty it wherever it stands, anywhere around Greater London: keep it off and call 0333 366 0103.