AdBlue in the Diesel Tank in Drumlough? Keep It Switched Off
Engine off, ignition off: that is where you start if AdBlue has gone into your diesel tank. Chemically, AdBlue is just urea in water. Unlike fuel, it neither burns nor mixes, and no harm happens until the engine sucks it round. Caught before the engine has been run, AdBlue in a diesel tank is generally a drain and a thorough flush, done where your car is in Drumlough. Ring 0333 366 0103 before you do anything else.
What to do straight away, Drumlough: AdBlue in your diesel tank
Things to do:
- Take the keys out, and so no one switches your ignition on.
- Put the hazards on if you are at all near moving traffic.
- The empty bottle or the receipt shows us the product and the amount, so don't throw it out.
- Tell us a postcode starting BT26 6, or whichever street lies nearest, and the van finds you straight — so ring wherever you stand.
Don't:
- Not even for a second, and not to roll the vehicle: the engine stays off.
- The ignition remains off: on lots of diesels, turning it on is enough to run your pump.
- AdBlue does not dilute in diesel — it separates out — so adding extra diesel won't weaken it.
- Keep the vehicle where it is rather than driving it anywhere, even a short way down Dunskey Street.
- By the road, don't try emptying it on your own.
Ask the attendants to help you move your car away from the island if you are on a forecourt around Drumlough, whether it's the the nearest petrol station or somewhere else. Stopped on your own drive? Then it remains exactly where it is.
AdBlue in a diesel tank: what it does
AdBlue is made for the exhaust, not the motor. Its own tank holds it, and from there it's fed into the exhaust, and there it treats the gas. No part in a fuel pump is made for this fluid — and none of that was meant to go through one.
It does not blend. After it's poured into a tank of diesel, AdBlue acts not at all like fuel. The pickup sucks fuel from the deepest part of the tank, and that's precisely where AdBlue ends up: being heavier than diesel, it sinks. Once your pump runs, the AdBlue is top of the list to be pulled through. Before then it sits underneath the diesel, which is why a car filled in Hillsborough yesterday and not switched on stays the straightforward one, as long as nobody touches your key.
From there it does two kinds of harm. What is left when the water evaporates is urea, which forms crystals: they settle in tiny channels and clog filters. On top of that, it attacks certain metals in a fuel system, and keeps going till it is cleared out. Lines carrying AdBlue spell harm overnight for a car sitting around Drumlough. Just in the tank, it stays stable. Water lubricates nothing. The injection pump and each injector need diesel flowing past them, so the water content harms them in its own right.
Why AdBlue in a diesel is regularly more serious than petrol
Put petrol in a diesel at the another forecourt nearby and you have an issue of thin fuel. Blended into the diesel and left unused, it is harmless for now; running your engine does the harm.
The trouble with AdBlue in a diesel is a completely wrong substance. Not burning, it can't just be run through. Whether the vehicle is in Dromara or the heart of Drumlough, firing it up "to see" does more harm with AdBlue than almost any other error, and the flush matters for more. Why: it won't stay blended, so diluting it is impossible; and deposits and corrosion outlast the next fill.
As with petrol, there's good news. Wherever across County Down your car has stopped, an unrun motor means the AdBlue still inside the reservoir: the easiest part of any fuel system to clear.
How AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank in Drumlough
No one means to do it. The AdBlue filler on many motors rests right next to your diesel filler, occasionally under the same flap, and the two caps can look alike in poor light. Mostly it takes place with a bottle bought on the way home and poured in on the driveway, not at the forecourt.
Mostly, it takes place in one of a couple of familiar ways. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up occurs in a hurry outside the local primary school. Someone pours the container in at home, just off Heugh Road, as the day ends. One more version: darkness, a pub car park outside the pub in the village, and a driver opening that flap the first time.
The least known vehicles see it most — hire cars, brand-new ones, fleet cars, and the other vehicle of a family with one of each fuel types. An identical slip, an identical first response — leave it off — wherever you happen to be in Drumlough or the remainder of County Down.
AdBlue in the diesel tank around Drumlough, and your engine started?
If so, the AdBlue is no longer inside that tank. Via the fuel filter, through the lines, and — given any running — into the injection pump and each injector: that's how far it has gone.
Maybe returning from the green space at the edge of the village, or part way across Drumlough, the motor might run lumpy, smoke, lose pace, light up your dash or stall. No restarting to check: stop once it is safe, then switch everything off. Each start pulls more of it through.
Leave the M77, over 50 miles from Drumlough, at the first junction and park safely, not driving on.
How far it went counts. A few hundred yards across Drumlough to the car park by the centre is a very different job from a run towards Lisburn, under 10 miles away, with the AdBlue reaching further into the system with each mile. Let us know roughly how far it had come.
There is more to rinse out once the engine has been started, and our engineers do all of it where the car has ended up. When it's noticed soon, permanent damage is very rare.
Drumlough: how AdBlue is drained from a diesel
A road by a street just off the centre, a drive, a layby or a forecourt: anywhere the car has come to rest around Drumlough, our technicians travel to it. What was put in, roughly the quantity, and if the engine has been run: our engineers check first, since those shape the job.
Next, draining the tank right there removes the polluted diesel along with the AdBlue together. What remains from AdBlue will not wash away by itself, so the whole system gets a careful flush, which counts much more here than for petrol. Next, the filter: flushed, or replaced when it must be. After that fresh diesel, and then a test of the vehicle. Not run? Then count on roughly half an hour once we are there for most jobs. The pumping gear is explosion-proof, and so a busy forecourt is no problem, and it is hushed enough for a residential street after dark.
Bleeding the system with clean diesel comes last. Whether it is a parking space at the nearest station or a driveway in Drumlough, that is where we start the car and you drive off. It is checked on clean diesel to make sure it runs smoothly before our engineers go. No workshop is required at any point, with the whole job done on the spot. Insurers ask for a VAT invoice and an engineer report, and you get both at the end.
About Drumlough, for a moment
Drumlough is a small locality in County Down, situated inland at an elevation of 148 metres, approximately 5.7 miles from Lisburn. Drumlough is characterized by its predominantly detached housing stock, reflecting its rural setting. Drumlough sits near other localities such as Magheraconluce, Annahilt, and Ravernet, in the rolling countryside of Northern Ireland.
AdBlue drains in Drumlough and across County Down
AdBlue jobs around Drumlough are passed to teams that cover the places around it — Magheraconluce, Annahilt as well as Ravernet — and most of County Down beyond, throughout BT postcodes. Close to a boundary, or anywhere tricky to explain? Asking is better than guessing, and so phone.
A van that comes to you fits Drumlough, a small village: there's no need to bring your vehicle to us, since our engineers drain it there, in a drive, a residential street, a parking area or a forecourt.
AdBlue in a diesel tank in Drumlough: the cost of fixing it
Each job is different, and so no fixed quote would be fair. What shifts the price is, first, whether the motor has run and for how long; then how much AdBlue got in; and after that where the car is and whether a technician can get to it safely, which is easier on an open driveway than in a tight gap behind the far end of the built-up part.
That's why every call from Drumlough starts with the same three queries, asked before giving a figure, not after: what was put in, how much, and whether it's run. When they are known, a range turns into one firm figure.
You get that price on the phone, before anybody sets off, and you pay on the day, by card or over the phone, with nothing upfront. Misfuelling cover comes with plenty of insurance policies, so it pays to look at yours before the van gets there.
In Drumlough and still alongside the car?
Then, the most helpful thing to do with the vehicle is to not touch it. Keys out, engine off, ignition off. Phone 0333 366 0103: AdBlue, roughly how much, and whether the engine ran are everything our engineers need. Petrol in Diesel handles the remainder throughout County Down, Drumlough included.