Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Duddingston
With AdBlue in your diesel tank, your ignition stays off and so does your motor. Urea dissolved in water is all AdBlue is. Unlike fuel, it neither burns nor mixes, and nothing starts till the engine pulls it round. Caught before the motor has run, AdBlue in a diesel tank is generally a drain and a thorough flush, done where the car is around Duddingston. Before you do anything else, phone 0333 366 0103.
AdBlue in the diesel tank around Duddingston: the first few minutes
Things to do:
- Keys out — that way nobody can power anything on.
- Put the hazard lights on if you're at all near moving traffic.
- Hold on to the till receipt or the empty bottle, and so you can tell us what got in and roughly how much.
- Ring right where you are. Say a EH15 1 postcode or the nearest street sign, and nobody has to search for you.
Don't:
- Not even briefly, and not to shift the vehicle: your motor stays off.
- The ignition stays off: on many diesels, turning it on is enough to start the fuel pump.
- AdBlue does not mix in diesel — it separates out — so adding extra fuel won't weaken it.
- Any driving at all is best avoided, even a short stretch up Durham Place West.
- Emptying the tank yourself beside the road isn't one to try.
At a forecourt around Duddingston, whether it's the Esso or another one, ask the staff to help you push the vehicle clear of the pump. Parked on your own driveway? Then it remains exactly as it is.
AdBlue in a diesel tank, and what it does there
AdBlue is made for the exhaust, not the motor. Stored in a separate tank, it is injected into the exhaust stream to treat the gases. Nothing in it is supposed to pass through a fuel pump, and nothing in a fuel pump is made to handle it.
Inside a diesel tank it acts very differently from fuel. It does not mix in. It's heavier than diesel, so it sinks and gathers at the bottom of that tank, which is where the pickup pulls fuel from. A motor topped up on a drive in Willowbrae yesterday evening and left unstarted is the straightforward one. Nothing has sucked the AdBlue up yet — but once your motor turns, that's what is pulled first, straight from the bottom of the tank.
It causes two kinds of damage from there. It eats at certain metals found in fuel components, attacking any part it reaches till it is removed from the system. And when the water goes, the urea forms crystals that clog filters and lodge in narrow channels. Where the AdBlue has reached the lines, waiting till morning around Duddingston leaves things worse. Inside that tank alone, time does nothing. Diesel protects the injection pump and each injector as it flows; water gives no lubrication, which is a separate form of damage.
AdBlue in a diesel: why it is often worse than petrol
Put petrol in a diesel at the Asda and you have a fault of thin fuel. Mixed through your diesel and sitting still, it's harmless for now; running the engine is the damage.
With AdBlue in a diesel, the liquid itself is plainly the wrong one. Not burning, it can't just be run through. Crystals and corrosion stay after the following tankful, and AdBlue splits back out of the diesel, so watering it can't help. Hence the flush matters more, and turning your key "to see" does more harm here than nearly any other slip — in Piershill or the heart of Duddingston equally.
The same good news applies as with petrol. Never started? Then the AdBlue waits just inside your tank, the simplest bit of the entire system to empty, anywhere the car has come to rest around City of Edinburgh.
AdBlue in a diesel tank in Duddingston: how it ends up there
Nobody means to do it. The AdBlue filler on plenty of cars rests right next to the diesel filler, sometimes under the same flap, and the two caps can look alike in poor light. Usually it is not the filling station: someone picks up a bottle heading home and pours it in at home.
It tends to occur in a couple of familiar ways. Rushing, outside the local primary school, after a warning lamp came on during the school run, a parent refills the car. A bottle is poured in at the end of the day on a drive just off Mountcastle Drive South. Another pattern: dim light, the car park outside Portobello Bar, and someone using that flap for the first time.
Hired vehicles, new cars, company cars, or the second vehicle in a home with both fuels: the least known vehicles get it most. Same mistake, an identical first step — keep it switched off — anywhere you happen to be around Duddingston or the rest of City of Edinburgh.
Started the motor with AdBlue in the diesel tank around Duddingston?
Then the AdBlue has left that tank. Through the fuel filter, along the pipework, and — given any running time — into the high-pressure pump and every injector: that is where it travels.
Maybe returning from Bingham Park, or midway across Duddingston, your motor may go rough, smoke, lose pace, flash the dash or stall. Stop when it is safe. Turn off. Keep it off rather than restarting it to check. With each start, more of that is pulled through.
If you were on the M8, under 10 miles from Duddingston, come off at the next junction and stop somewhere safe rather than pressing on.
How far it went matters. A few hundred yards across Duddingston to the car park by Bingham Community Centre is a very different job from a run towards Edinburgh, under 3 miles away, with the AdBlue reaching further into the system with each mile. Roughly how far it had come is worth telling us.
There's more to rinse out once your engine has run, and we do all of it where the car has ended up. Caught soon, it very seldom leaves lasting damage.
What clearing AdBlue from a diesel involves around Duddingston
A street by St Mary Magdalene, a drive, a lay-by or a filling station: anywhere your car has come to rest around Duddingston, our engineers travel to it. Before anything else our technicians ask what went in, about how much, and if your engine has run, because those answers decide this work.
Next, emptying your tank right there removes the polluted diesel and the AdBlue together. Your system is cleaned thoroughly, which counts more with AdBlue than with petrol, since what it leaves behind doesn't rinse out on its own. The fuel filter is flushed, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and the vehicle is tested. Most of these jobs are a half-hour visit once we get there, if your motor hasn't run. Our pumping gear is explosion-proof, and so a busy filling station is no fault, and it is hushed enough for a residential street late at night.
Priming the system with new diesel comes at the end. You drive off as soon as our technicians have fired it up, and it makes no difference whether your car is on a driveway in Duddingston or in a space at Brunstane. It's tested on fresh diesel to make sure it runs smoothly before our technicians go. Since the job is done in full where your car is, a workshop never comes into it. At the end, you are given the paperwork for your insurer: a VAT invoice and a report from the engineer.
About Duddingston
Duddingston is a suburban area in the City of Edinburgh, situated near the coast and approximately 2.6 miles from Edinburgh city centre. Duddingston lies close to the Firth of Forth, at an elevation of around 32 metres, and is bordered by nearby places such as Portobello and Northfield. Duddingston has a population of around 4948 people and predominantly features detached housing. Duddingston is also located near Niddrie, another suburban area in the city.
AdBlue drains around Duddingston and across City of Edinburgh
Over the EH postcode area, the teams answering AdBlue jobs around Duddingston reach much of City of Edinburgh as well, Portobello, Northfield and Niddrie included. If you are near a border, or somewhere hard to explain, ring and ask rather than assuming.
Duddingston is a residential suburb, and an on-site drain suits it: whether the vehicle is on a home drive, a residential street, a car park or a forecourt, our technicians drain it where it is, so it never needs to be moved to us.
Duddingston: what AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to fix
Not one flat figure would be fair, since each job differs. Whether the motor has been running, and for how long, comes first in what shifts the cost. How much AdBlue got in comes next, and then the position of the vehicle, because an open driveway is simpler for a van to get to safely than a tight space behind Southfield Hall.
Before a quote, not after, every enquiry from Duddingston opens with the same three checks: the fuel, the amount, and if it ran. With them, the range shrinks to a single fixed figure.
Before anyone sets off, you are told the price by phone. Then you pay on the day, card or over the phone, with nothing in advance. Check your insurance whilst we're on the way: plenty include misfuelling cover.
Still alongside the car around Duddingston?
Right now, the most helpful thing to do with your car is to not touch it. Keys out; motor and ignition off. Phone 0333 366 0103: AdBlue, the amount, plus if the engine ran are everything our technicians ask. Petrol in Diesel takes over the rest throughout City of Edinburgh, Duddingston too.