Derwent Haugh: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Avoid It?
Leave your engine and ignition off and call 0333 366 0103 now — the rest can wait when AdBlue is already in the diesel tank. A drain and a full flush, done right where the car sits in Derwent Haugh, is usually what it takes if found before the motor runs. If you are reading before it has happened, the remainder of this page is about why it takes place and how to make sure it doesn't.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel motor need its own filler?
Many newer diesels in South Benwell, as well as Derwent Haugh, run on two fluids; your motor gets just your diesel. AdBlue goes to the exhaust, where it is sprayed into the gas to clean it, and it lives in a tank of its own.
Different tanks, different fillers. Under one flap, next to each other: that's the arrangement on a lot of vehicles. On others, AdBlue's filler sits under the bonnet or in the boot instead. At the petrol pump, the diesel side is topped up constantly. Someone who has to stop and work out where it goes normally fills the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and far less often. The error lives in that gap.
How does AdBlue in the diesel tank take place around Derwent Haugh?
Rarely is it carelessness: normally three things line up.
Hurry follows from the warning. Your car tells you as AdBlue runs low, and an empty tank puts it into limp mode — so the top-up gets done in a rush, before work on a drive off Hollinside Road, or on the way home in the car park outside Wetherspoons.
The old car's cap is where the hand goes — yet a hire car, a new vehicle or a company car keeps the fillers somewhere else. That's the second factor: an unfamiliar vehicle.
Nothing stops the tip once it has started, since a bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one. The bottle fits. The same few seconds settle it, in the middle of Derwent Haugh or out in Swalwell.
Telling the AdBlue filler from your diesel filler
Check these before pouring, on a forecourt around Derwent Haugh or a driveway out in Whickham. A few seconds, that's all.
- Where it sits can mislead; the cap doesn't. AdBlue caps tend to be blue or carry the word "AdBlue" — diesel caps normally don't.
- Check the size: the smaller neck is, on many vehicles, the AdBlue one.
- The flap. Look inside the fuel flap for a label. Plenty of cars 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.
- The previous driver will know. Check as you pick up a rental or fleet car — from Metrocentre's car park, say — not once the warning comes on.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching the diesel tank
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever across Tyne and Wear that is.
- Park and switch off. Not on a slope, not with the engine running, and not in a rush on the side of .
- Silly as it sounds, speaking "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap does the trick — once you have located your filler and read it.
- Leave the diesel cap on. If both sit under one flap, check your diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle.
- Slowly does it, through the bottle's own spout, till it is full or the bottle runs out.
- Close the cap, and look once more — making sure the diesel cap stayed shut the whole time. Only then, start the car.
Discover during the second or third stage that the bottle went into the diesel tank? That is where you stop. Step five stays out.
Already put AdBlue in the diesel tank around Derwent Haugh?
Do not start the engine: that is where the short order of things starts. On many diesels the ignition alone runs the fuel pump, so don't switch the car on. Filling up with diesel won't weaken it: rather than mixing, AdBlue sinks to the base of your tank, just where the fuel is drawn from.
Ask the attendants to help push your car away from the petrol pump if you are on a forecourt — the Asda, the BP or somewhere else. Leave it where it is if you're on your own driveway around Derwent Haugh.
Where your motor has run by now, pull over somewhere safe then switch the car off. Derwent Haugh sits under 3 miles from the Central Motorway East; there, use the next exit. A short hop across Derwent Haugh is a smaller job than a run towards Newcastle upon Tyne, under 3 miles away, and so tell us about how far it went.
When we turn up around Derwent Haugh, what takes place?
By Swalwell Primary School, near Odeon or on your own drive: wherever your car has stopped, we come to it. What liquid was put in, the quantity, and if it ran: our technicians ask since those answers decide the work and price. You get that quote on the phone, before anybody heads out.
Emptying your tank comes next, then a full flush of your system. More than with petrol, it matters here: the crystals form, certain metals corrode, and none of it washes out unaided, no matter how long it is left. The fuel filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; fresh diesel goes in; and the car is tested. We don't go until it has been fired up and is running smoothly.
Using pumps safe on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night, most jobs in which the motor hasn't run need about half an hour once we are there. No money in advance; you settle up on the day. Afterwards, the VAT invoice and a report from the engineer are handed to you for your insurer. Wrong-fuel cover is part of many insurance policies — so make use of the wait to check yours.
About Derwent Haugh
Derwent Haugh is a suburban area located on the River Derwent in Tyne and Wear, with semi-detached housing being the predominant type of accommodation. Derwent Haugh sits at a low elevation of around 8 metres, close to the city of Newcastle upon Tyne, which is approximately 2.9 miles away. Derwent Haugh is near several other suburban areas, including Swalwell, Paradise, and Beechgrove, and is part of the wider Newcastle upon Tyne urban area.
AdBlue drains round Derwent Haugh, and Tyne and Wear beyond
Paradise and Beechgrove are among the towns around Derwent Haugh, a residential suburb, that the same vans cover, over NE postcodes. The van reaches you fastest with a postcode starting NE11 9.
The vehicle remains where it is. The drain happens right there, whether a driveway, a road near Clip And Climb, or a layby on the way to Cross Lane Meadows nature reserve. Guessing won't help at the back of Metrocentre, close to a boundary, or anywhere awkward to pin down; ring and ask.
In short, for Derwent Haugh motorists
Read the cap before you tip. Petrol in Diesel empties it where it stands, anywhere in Tyne and Wear, if AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank regardless — and so leave the vehicle off then call 0333 366 0103.