Droitwich Spa: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Avoid It?
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave the engine and the ignition off and ring 0333 366 0103. Normally, if your engine hasn't turned, it's drained and fully purged where the car sits around Droitwich Spa. If you're reading before it has happened, the remainder of this page is about why it takes place and how to make sure it doesn't.
AdBlue in a diesel car, and its separate tank
Not one fluid but two: that is how plenty of newer diesels near Droitwich Spa and Newtown run, with diesel feeding the motor. Your exhaust, not your engine, is where AdBlue ends up: dosed into the gas to clean it, from a separate tank.
There is a filler on every tank. Other cars keep the AdBlue filler in the boot or under the bonnet; plenty more place the two side by side behind one flap. At the pump, the diesel side gets filled constantly. Someone who has to stop and work out where it goes usually tops up the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and far less regularly. The mistake grows in the gap between them.
Droitwich Spa: how AdBlue in your diesel tank happens
It's seldom carelessness. Three things tend to line up.
Hurry comes 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 quickly, before work on a drive off Worcester Road, or heading home in the car park outside Barley Mow.
The old car's cap is where your hand goes — yet a rental car, a new motor or a company car puts the fillers elsewhere. That's a second factor: a new motor.
Third, the bottle fits: diesel filler or AdBlue one, it goes in just as easily, and after the pour begins, no part halts it. The Vines or the heart of Droitwich Spa: it takes the same few seconds in both.
Telling the AdBlue filler from the diesel filler
Before you pour anything, whether on a driveway in Westacre or a forecourt in Droitwich Spa, check these. They take a few seconds.
- Colour and lettering: an AdBlue cap is commonly blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap usually doesn't. Go by the cap, not its position.
- The size. On many vehicles the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- A label inside the fuel flap often shows which fuel goes where, on plenty of vehicles. Check for it.
- The handbook. If the filler is not by your diesel cap, it's in the boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- The person who drove the car last. On a hire or company car collected from somewhere like the car park outside the nearest station, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
Keeping AdBlue out of the diesel tank when you top up
When the light comes on, wherever across Worcestershire, follow this routine.
- Stop on level, motor off, with time to spare — not rushing on the side of Queen Street.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, once you find the AdBlue filler and read it. Daft, yes, yet it works.
- If both sit under one flap, check the diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — then leave the vehicle on.
- Using the bottle's own spout, pour slowly — and stop when it is full or the bottle is empty.
- Before you start the car, shut the cap and look again that the diesel cap never opened off.
Find at stage two or three that it's already gone into your diesel side? Then stop right there. Do not go on to step five.
Put AdBlue in the diesel tank around Droitwich Spa already?
Don't start your engine: that's how the short order of things begins. Leave the ignition off as well, because on many diesels it by itself runs your fuel pump. Thinning it with more diesel fails, because AdBlue sinks to the bottom instead of mixing — and that's where the fuel is drawn from.
Ask the attendants to help push the car away from the pump if you are at a forecourt — the Valero, the Sainsbury's or anywhere else. At home around Droitwich Spa? Then your car stays where it is.
Already run? Pull over when it is safe, then switch off. On the M5, under a mile from Droitwich Spa, that means the next junction. Mileage matters — a short hop across Droitwich Spa makes a smaller job than heading under 10 miles to Worcester — so tell us about how far it went.
When our technicians arrive around Droitwich Spa, what occurs?
The van reaches the vehicle wherever it stopped — your own driveway, near St Andrew, or outside St Peter's Droitwich CofE Academy. Our technicians ask what was put in, roughly how much, and whether it has run, because those answers decide the work and the price. No one heads out before you've had the quote over the phone.
The system is then rinsed thoroughly, once that tank is cleared. Unlike petrol, AdBlue forms crystals and eats at certain fuel-system metals, and none of that washes away unaided. That is why it counts more. The fuel filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and the vehicle is tested. We don't leave until it has been started and is running correctly.
If the engine hasn't 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. No money in advance; you settle up that day. Afterwards, the VAT invoice and a report from the engineer are handed to you for your insurer. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it is worth checking yours while we're on the way.
About Droitwich Spa, briefly
Droitwich Spa is a town in Worcestershire, situated on the River Salwarpe, with a mix of semi-detached housing and other residential properties. Droitwich Spa has a population of around 12531 people and is located near several smaller communities, including The Vines, Hill End, and Netherwich. Droitwich Spa sits at an elevation of 33 metres, close to the city of Worcester, which is approximately 6 miles away. Droitwich Spa is also within commuting distance of larger cities, being around 100 miles from London.
AdBlue drains around Droitwich Spa and across Worcestershire
Hill End and Netherwich are among the towns around Droitwich Spa, a spa town, that the same teams cover, throughout WR postcodes. The van reaches you fastest with a postcode starting WR9 8.
The car remains put. Draining takes place right there, be it a driveway, a street near Tile Mosaic, or a layby towards Vines Park. Ring and ask rather than guessing if you're close to a border, or somewhere hard to describe, like the back of Rotary House.
The short version for Droitwich Spa people
Pour no AdBlue until you've read the cap. AdBlue in your diesel tank after all? Leave the car switched off then phone 0333 366 0103; Petrol in Diesel drains it where it stands, across Worcestershire.