Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Ditchingham Dam
With AdBlue in your diesel tank, your ignition stays off and so does the motor. AdBlue is urea mixed in water. Unlike fuel, it neither burns nor mixes, and nothing happens till your motor pulls it round. If the motor has not run yet, AdBlue in a diesel tank is usually emptied and carefully purged where the car stands in Ditchingham Dam. Before you do anything else, call 0333 366 0103.
Those opening minutes: AdBlue in the diesel tank in Ditchingham Dam
To do:
- Pocket your keys, and that prevents someone switching the power on.
- If you're anywhere close to moving traffic, put your hazards on.
- So you can tell us which fluid it was and roughly what quantity, keep your receipt or the empty bottle.
- Ring us from where you are. A postcode starting NR35 2, or the name of the closest street, brings our van to you without a search.
Not to do:
- Not even for a second, and not to roll your car: your motor stays off.
- The ignition remains off: on lots of diesels, turning it on is enough to start the fuel pump.
- No more fuel added. The AdBlue will not mix, and so it is pointless.
- Do not drive the vehicle anywhere, not even a short way up Bridge Street.
- Draining your tank yourself by the road is not worth trying.
The staff working at any Ditchingham Dam filling station — the The Co-operative included — will usually help rolling it aside if you ask. Parked on your own drive? Then it remains just where it is.
What does AdBlue do in a diesel tank?
Not the engine but the exhaust is where AdBlue belongs. It goes into its own tank and is sprayed into your exhaust gas to fresh it. A fuel pump is not made to take it, and AdBlue was never intended to go through one.
It doesn't combine. After it is poured into a tank of diesel, AdBlue acts nothing like fuel. Denser than diesel, it drops and collects below it — the same place the pickup draws from. A vehicle topped up on a driveway in Temple Bar overnight and left unstarted is the straightforward case. Nothing has sucked the AdBlue up yet — but when your motor runs, that is what goes first, straight from the bottom of your tank.
It causes two kinds of damage from there. It attacks some metals found in fuel systems, attacking whatever it reaches till it is cleared from the system. And once the water evaporates, the urea forms crystals that clog filters and settle in narrow passages. If the AdBlue is in the lines, waiting overnight around Ditchingham Dam leaves it worse. Inside that tank only, waiting costs nothing. Water protects nothing. The injection pump and each injector depend on diesel flowing past them, so the water part harms them in its own right.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel commonly the bigger problem?
Fill a diesel with petrol by mistake at the Shell, and the issue is diluted fuel. Mixed into your diesel and left unused, it is harmless at that stage; using your engine does the harm.
AdBlue in a diesel is a different problem: not thin fuel, but no fuel at all. It can't just be run through, since it does not burn. Nor can it be watered down, since it splits again — and the following tankful won't rinse away deposits or corrosion. So the flush counts more with AdBlue, and trying the engine "to see", in the heart of Ditchingham Dam or out in Annis Hill, does more harm than nearly any other error.
As with petrol, there is good news. Never run? Then the AdBlue waits just inside the tank, the easiest section of the whole system to clear, wherever the car has stopped in Norfolk.
How AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank around Ditchingham Dam
In dim light, two caps together — the AdBlue one and the diesel one, occasionally under a single flap — may appear the same. No one means it; plenty of designs allow it. It mostly takes place outside the house, from a bottle grabbed on the journey home, rather than at the forecourt.
It tends to take place in a few familiar ways. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up occurs in a hurry outside St Edmund's Catholic Primary School. A driver pours the container in at home, right off Ditchingham Dam, as the day ends. Another version: darkness, the car park outside The Chequers Inn, and someone opening that flap for the first time.
The least familiar vehicles get it the most — hire cars, brand-new cars, company ones, and the spare motor in a family with both fuel types. Wherever you are in Ditchingham Dam or the remainder of Norfolk, it is the same error and the same first answer: leave the vehicle off.
AdBlue in your diesel tank around Ditchingham Dam, and the engine started?
Then the AdBlue has left your tank. Via the fuel filter, along the lines, and — with any running time — on to the injection pump and every injector: that is where it travels.
Perhaps coming back from Dinky's Garden, or midway across Ditchingham Dam, your motor might go lumpy, smoke, drop pace, flash the dash or stall. No starting it again to test: pull over when safe, then turn everything off. Each start pulls more of it through.
If you were on the M11, over 50 miles from Ditchingham Dam, come off at the next exit and stop somewhere sensible instead of pressing on.
Hopping across Ditchingham Dam to the car park by The Fisher Theatre is one matter; driving for Norwich, under 15 miles away, is something else, since each mile carries the AdBlue further in. So distance matters. Roughly how far it had come is worth telling us.
Once your engine has run, the flush covers more, and all of it is done where the vehicle has come to a stop. Lasting damage is very rare when it is caught early.
Emptying AdBlue in a diesel in Ditchingham Dam: what it takes
Our engineers come to the vehicle, wherever it has stopped in Ditchingham Dam: a side street near Bungay Town Council, a drive, a lay-by or a forecourt. Before anything else our engineers ask what was put in, about how much, and whether your engine has run, since those answers settle the work.
Next, emptying that tank on the spot takes out the contaminated diesel along with the AdBlue in one go. A full flush counts far more after AdBlue than after petrol, because residue won't clear out by itself. Next, the filter: flushed, or replaced if it must be. After that clean diesel, then a check of the car. If the engine has not run, most jobs take about half an hour once we arrive. The pumps are explosion-proof, fine on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night.
The last step is to prime your system on fresh diesel. Then our engineers start the engine and you drive off, whether from a parking space by Beccles or a drive around Ditchingham Dam. The check before our engineers head off is that it runs properly on clean diesel. No garage is needed at any point, with the whole job done then and there. At the end, you are given paperwork for your insurer: a VAT invoice plus a report from the engineer.
About Ditchingham Dam, for a moment
Ditchingham Dam is a suburban area situated on the riverside in Norfolk, with a low elevation of around 6 metres. Ditchingham Dam lies near the city of Norwich, approximately 13 miles to the south, and is close to nearby places such as Bungay and Ditchingham. Ditchingham Dam has a population of around 1814 people, predominantly living in terraced housing. Ditchingham Dam is located in the Eastern region of England, about 93 miles from London.
AdBlue drains in Ditchingham Dam and across Norfolk
Bungay, Ditchingham and Wainford are among the towns around Ditchingham Dam that the same vans serve, together with much of Norfolk further out, over the NR postcode area. If you are near a boundary, or somewhere hard to explain, ring and ask instead of guessing.
Ditchingham Dam is a residential suburb, and a mobile drain suits it: whether your car is on a home drive, a residential street, a car park or a forecourt, our engineers drain it where it sits, and so it never needs to be moved to us.
AdBlue in a diesel tank around Ditchingham Dam: the cost of fixing it
Not one single figure could be honest, because every job is different. What shifts the price is, first of all, whether your engine has been running and for how long; then how much AdBlue went in; and after that where your car is and whether a technician can reach it safely, which is simpler on an open driveway than in a tight spot behind Bungay Museum.
That is why each call from Ditchingham Dam starts with the same three questions, asked before giving a figure, not after: what got in, how much, and if it's run. Given them, a range narrows to a single fixed number.
Priced on the call before the van sets out, it is paid for that day — card or phone, no deposit. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it's worth checking yours while we are on the way.
Still beside the vehicle in Ditchingham Dam?
Right now, the best thing to do with your vehicle is to not touch it. Engine off, keys out, ignition off. Call 0333 366 0103 and tell us it's AdBlue, about how much, and whether it's run. Petrol in Diesel takes it from there, around Ditchingham Dam or anywhere across Norfolk.