Danderhall: AdBlue in the Diesel Tank? Leave It Off
If AdBlue has gone into the diesel tank, leave the engine off and keep the ignition off. Chemically, AdBlue is just urea in water. The harm starts once it's sucked through the lines — it will not ignite, and it will not combine with diesel. If your engine has not run yet, AdBlue in a diesel tank is generally drained and carefully purged where the vehicle sits around Danderhall. Nothing comes before ringing 0333 366 0103.
Your next steps straight away, Danderhall: AdBlue in the diesel tank
Do:
- Remove your keys, which prevents someone switching the electrics on.
- Hazards on, if moving traffic is anywhere close.
- The empty bottle or your receipt shows us the product and the quantity, so do not bin it away.
- Tell us a postcode starting EH22 1, or whatever street lies closest, and the van finds you directly — so ring wherever you are.
Not to do:
- Moving the car just a few yards is no reason to fire up your motor.
- Don't switch your ignition on. On plenty of diesels that alone runs the fuel pump.
- No more fuel on top. The AdBlue will not blend, and so it is wasted.
- Don't drive the car anywhere, not even a short way up Campview.
- No draining it yourself, either, on the roadside.
Ask the attendants to help you roll the car away from the pumps if you're on a forecourt in Danderhall, whether it is the Morrisons or somewhere else. At your own driveway, do not touch it at all.
AdBlue in a diesel tank: what it does
The motor isn't what AdBlue is made for; the exhaust is. Its own reservoir keeps it, and from there it's sprayed into the exhaust, and there it cleans the fumes. No part inside a fuel pump is designed for this fluid — and none of that was meant to go through one.
Tipped in with your diesel, it stays separate instead of blending — entirely unlike fuel. It's heavier than diesel, and so it sinks and collects at the bottom of that tank, which is where the pickup draws fuel from. A motor topped up on a driveway in Cleikimin yesterday evening and not started since counts as the simple case. Nothing has pulled the AdBlue up yet — but when your engine runs, that is what is pulled first, directly from the bottom of that tank.
Two kinds of harm come from there. It attacks certain metals found in fuel components, attacking any part it reaches until it is removed from the system. And when the water evaporates, the urea turns into crystals that block filters and settle in tiny channels. If the AdBlue has reached the lines, leaving it till morning in Danderhall leaves it worse. In the tank alone, time does nothing. Water protects nothing. The injection pump and every injector depend on diesel flowing past them, and so the water part damages them in its own right.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel often the bigger issue?
Put petrol in a diesel at the Wm Turnbull and you have a problem of thin fuel. It mixes with your diesel, and while it is inside the tank it does no harm; the harm comes from running your engine on it.
AdBlue in a diesel is a fault of the wrong substance altogether. Since it does not burn, running it through isn't an option. It does not stay mixed, and so it cannot be thinned. And crystals and corrosion don't wash out with the next tank of fuel. That is why the flush matters more with AdBlue than with petrol, and why starting the motor "to see" costs more here than almost anywhere else, whether your car is in Gilmerton or the middle of Danderhall.
As with petrol, there is good news. Anywhere in Midlothian your car has stopped, an unrun engine means the AdBlue still inside the tank: the easiest bit of a fuel system to empty.
Danderhall: how AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank
Plenty of vehicles place the AdBlue filler beside the diesel one, occasionally under one flap, and in dim light the two may appear identical. No one intends it. A bottle picked up when driving home and tipped in at home, rather than at the filling station, is the usual route.
The ways it happens are few and familiar. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up happens in a hurry outside the local primary school. Close to Edmonstone Road, someone tips a bottle in on that drive in the evening. Or the vehicle is topped up in the car park outside Edmonstone Inn, in poor light, by somebody who has never opened that flap before.
Rented motors, new vehicles, fleet vehicles, or the spare vehicle in a home with both fuels: the least familiar vehicles get it most. Wherever in Midlothian, Danderhall included, the slip does not change, and neither does the first step: keep it switched off.
Already started the motor with AdBlue in the diesel tank in Danderhall?
The AdBlue has left the tank, then. It has been sucked through the filter and the lines, and if the motor ran for any time, it has reached the high-pressure fuel pump and your injectors.
You may notice your motor running unevenly, smoking, losing power, showing warning lights or cutting out, perhaps on the way back from Miners Memorial Garden or halfway across Danderhall. Once you safely can, pull over then switch everything off — without restarting to see. Every start pulls more of that through.
Exit the M8, under 10 miles from Danderhall, by the next junction and stop safely, rather than carrying on.
Distance counts: every mile carries the AdBlue deeper into the system, and so driving towards Edinburgh, under 5 miles away, makes a far larger job than hopping across Danderhall to the car park by Miners killed at Monktonhall Memorial. Let us know about how far it had come.
We do all of the cleaning where the car has come to a stop, and once your engine has run there is more of it. Permanent damage is very unusual if it's caught quickly.
What clearing AdBlue from a diesel involves in Danderhall
Anywhere it has stopped around Danderhall — a forecourt, a layby, a drive, a street beside Monktonhall Colliery Memorial — our van comes to the car. Three replies shape the work, so before anything else our technicians ask what went in, roughly the amount, plus whether the engine has run.
The contaminated diesel and the urea come out as one after that tank is drained, right there. A careful flush matters far more after AdBlue than after petrol, since what remains will not clear away by itself. Your filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and your car is tested. The majority of these jobs are a half-hour visit once our engineers arrive, if the motor has not run. Explosion-proof pumps mean a busy forecourt sensible to work on, and they run quiet enough to spare the street at night.
The final step is to bleed the system on fresh diesel. Whether it is a parking space at Shawfair or a drive in Danderhall, that is where our engineers fire it up and you drive off. Before leaving, our engineers check it's running smoothly with fresh diesel in. The whole job is done where the car is, so it never has to be taken to a workshop. You get a VAT invoice and an engineer report after that, which is what insurers want.
About Danderhall
Danderhall is a village in Midlothian, situated near the coast and approximately 4.3 miles from Edinburgh. Danderhall has a relatively low elevation of 72 metres and is characterized by terraced housing. Danderhall is part of the wider Edinburgh urban area, with nearby places including Newton Village, Millerhill, and Moredun.
AdBlue drains around Danderhall and across Midlothian
The teams that answer AdBlue call-outs in Danderhall also cover the places around it, Newton Village, Millerhill and Moredun among them, and most of Midlothian beyond, across the EH postcode area. If you are near a border, or somewhere hard to describe, ring and ask instead of guessing.
A van that comes to you fits Danderhall, a coastal village: you have no need to bring your vehicle to us, because our engineers drain it there, in a drive, a side street, a car park or a filling station.
What AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to put right around Danderhall
Each job is different, and so not one fixed quote is fair. The price moves first with how long, if at all, your engine has been running, and next with the amount of AdBlue that got in. After that it depends on where the vehicle is and whether our van can reach it safely, which is simpler on an open drive than in a tight gap behind 800 Years of Lothian Coalfield.
Before any figure, not after, every enquiry from Danderhall begins with three checks: the fuel, the amount, and if it ran. Given them, the range narrows to a single firm figure.
Our quote is quoted on the call, before a van sets off; payment comes on the day, by card or by phone, with nothing upfront. As our engineer is on the way, dig out your insurance: many include misfuelling.
Still beside the car in Danderhall?
In that case, touch nothing — that is the best step there is. Keys out; motor and ignition off. Call 0333 366 0103 then tell us it's AdBlue, about how much, and if it's run. Petrol in Diesel takes it from there, in Danderhall or anywhere around Midlothian.