Why It Happens and How to Avoid It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Dudley Wood
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave your engine and your ignition off then call 0333 366 0103. In Dudley Wood, catching it before the engine runs normally leaves draining and a full flush on the spot. Nothing happened yet? Below, the page explains the why it takes place and the ways to avoid it for good.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle: two tanks, two fillers
No single fluid but two: that is what many modern diesels near Dudley Wood and Primrose Hill carry, with diesel feeding your motor. Stored in a tank of its own, AdBlue is sprayed into your exhaust stream and cleans it.
Separate tanks, different fillers. Other vehicles keep the AdBlue filler in your boot or under the bonnet; a lot of others place both side by side behind one flap. Diesel goes in at each filling station visit, again and again. The AdBlue side is filled far less commonly, usually from a bottle, and normally by somebody who has to stop and think where it goes. That gap is where the mistake lives.
AdBlue in the diesel tank in Dudley Wood: how it takes place
Rarely is it carelessness: normally three things line up.
Hurry follows from the warning. Your car warns you as AdBlue runs low, and an empty tank sends it into limp mode — so the top-up happens quickly, before work on a driveway off Lantern Road, or on the way home in the car park at The Woodman.
Next, the hand goes for the cap it would have used on the old car — since a rental car, a new motor or a company car places the fillers where your last one did not.
A spout-topped bottle meets no obstacle at a diesel filler no more than at an AdBlue one. And so the tip, after begun, carries on. Whether it occurs in Bowling Green or the middle of Dudley Wood, it is the same few seconds.
Telling the AdBlue filler from the diesel filler
Before you pour anything, whether on a driveway in Darby End or a forecourt in Dudley Wood, check these. They take a couple of seconds.
- The cap. The AdBlue cap is regularly blue, or marked "AdBlue". The diesel cap usually is not. Read it instead of going by where it sits.
- On many vehicles, size gives it away: AdBlue has the smaller filler neck.
- The flap. Look inside the fuel flap for a label. Many vehicles say there which fuel goes where.
- In your boot or under the bonnet: that is where the filler is if it is not by the diesel cap, and the handbook tells you which.
- Picking up a hire or company car, say at the car park at Cradley Heath? Ask the person who drove the vehicle last before leaving, not when the light comes on.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching the diesel tank
Anywhere across West Midlands the light comes on, this is a routine for that day.
- Switch off once parked — level ground, motor off, and not in a rush beside Dudley Wood Avenue at the roadside.
- Silly as it sounds, saying "AdBlue" aloud as you unscrew the cap works — after you've found the filler and read it.
- The diesel cap remains on. Where the two share a flap, confirm it's closed before lifting the bottle.
- Slowly does it, through the bottle's own spout, till it is full or the bottle is empty.
- Shut the cap, then check again — making sure the diesel cap remained closed throughout. After that, start the car.
Stop there if you find, at stage two or three, that you have already poured into your diesel side. Do not go on to step five.
Dudley Wood: already put AdBlue in your diesel tank?
Brief list, then. Top of it: the engine stays off. Leave the ignition off too, because on many diesels switching it on alone starts your fuel pump. Filling up with diesel will not thin it: rather than mixing, AdBlue sinks to the base of the tank, just where the fuel is drawn from.
Ask the attendants to help push your car away from the pump if you're at a forecourt — the Tesco, the BP or somewhere else. Your own driveway around Dudley Wood is where it stays.
If your engine has already run, stop as soon as it is safe then switch off. Dudley Wood lies under 3 miles from the M5; there, use the first junction. A short hop across Dudley Wood is a smaller job than a run towards Birmingham, under 10 miles away, so tell us roughly how far it went.
What happens when we arrive in Dudley Wood
Anywhere the car came to rest, whether outside Dudley Wood Primary School, beside Dudley Wood Methodist Church or at home, our van comes to it. Both the work and the price rest on three answers — what liquid, what quantity, and whether it has run — so we ask. Nobody sets off before you have heard our quote over the phone.
Draining your tank comes next, followed by a thorough flush of the fuel system. Not like petrol, AdBlue leaves crystals and attacks some fuel-system metals, and neither clears out unaided. Hence it matters more. Filter cleaned or, where it must be, replaced; clean diesel in; then a test of your vehicle. Before we leave, our engineers fire it up and confirm that it's running properly.
Using pumps safe on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night, most jobs in which your motor has not run take about half an hour once our technicians are there. Your insurer will ask for the engineer's report and the VAT invoice, and both are yours once this job is done. Payment is on the day, with no deposit. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it is worth checking yours while we are on the way.
About Dudley Wood itself
Dudley Wood is a suburban area in the West Midlands, situated near the River Rea and close to the city of Birmingham. Dudley Wood has a mix of semi-detached housing and local amenities, with nearby places including Bowling Green and Cradley Heath. Dudley Wood sits at an elevation of around 103 metres, with the area being approximately 7.7 miles from Birmingham city centre.
AdBlue drains in Dudley Wood and across West Midlands
Being a residential suburb, Dudley Wood has the same vans as surrounding places — Mushroom Green, Cradley Heath — right through DY postcodes and the surrounding area beyond. Quote a postcode beginning DY2 0, and our van arrives quickest.
Your car stays put. A drive, a lay-by on the way to Black Country Millennium Forest, a side street near Dudley Wood Neighbourhood Learning Centre & Library Link: our engineers drain it where it is. Assuming won't help at the back of THE FURNITURE WAREHOUSE, on a border, or anywhere awkward to pin down; phone and ask.
In short, for Dudley Wood people
Always, the cap; then, the pour. AdBlue in the diesel tank after all? Keep it switched off and ring 0333 366 0103; Petrol in Diesel empties it on the spot, throughout West Midlands.