Preventing AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in East Dean: Why It Happens
Stop here a minute if the diesel tank already has AdBlue in it: ignition off, motor off, and ring 0333 366 0103. Normally, if your engine has not run, it's drained and fully flushed where your car is in East Dean. The remainder of this page explains why it happens and how to make sure it doesn't — useful if you are reading ahead of time.
AdBlue in a diesel motor, and its separate tank
Plenty of newer diesels around Jevington, like those in East Dean, carry on two fluids; the motor gets only the diesel. Your exhaust, not your motor, is where AdBlue ends up: dosed into the gas to fresh them, from a separate tank.
Different tanks, different fillers. Other vehicles keep the AdBlue filler in your boot or under the bonnet; plenty more place the two side by side behind one flap. Filling the diesel side at the petrol pump happens all the time. Far less often, the AdBlue side gets filled — mostly from a bottle, by a person thinking about where it goes. It is in that gap that the slip happens.
East Dean: how AdBlue in the diesel tank happens
Seldom is it carelessness: normally three things coincide.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low your car tells you, and if it runs out completely, the vehicle drops into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a driveway off Village Green Lane before work, or in the car park outside Tiger Inn on the way home.
Unfamiliar motors are second, as well. Hire cars, new vehicles and company vehicles put their fillers in new places, and habit reaches for the cap used on the old one.
And the bottle fits. A bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one, and so nothing stops the pour once it has started. The same few seconds settle it, in the middle of East Dean or out in Friston.
Which filler is for AdBlue, and which for diesel?
Check these first, on a forecourt in East Dean or a drive out in Westdean. Seconds, no more.
- Colour and marking: an AdBlue cap is commonly blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap normally doesn't. Go by the cap, not its position.
- On many cars, the size gives it away: AdBlue gets the smaller filler neck.
- Open the flap and look for a label — plenty of motors show what goes in each inlet just there.
- The handbook. If your filler isn't by the diesel cap, it's in your boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- Check with the person who drove it last — before you leave, not when the light comes on — if you collect a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park outside Eastbourne.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching the diesel tank
When the light comes on, anywhere in East Sussex, use this routine.
- Switch off once parked — level ground, motor stopped, and never in a rush beside Churchfield at the roadside.
- Silly as it sounds, speaking "AdBlue" aloud while you unscrew the cap does the trick — once you've located the filler and read it.
- The diesel cap stays on. Where both share a flap, make sure it's shut before the bottle comes up.
- Using the bottle's own spout, pour slowly — and stop when it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Only then, start your car: close the cap, check a second time, and make sure the diesel cap was never opened.
Discover during the second or third step that the bottle went into the diesel filler? That's where you stop. Never go on to step five.
Put AdBlue in the diesel tank in East Dean already?
Then the order of things is short. Do not start the engine. On plenty of diesels your ignition alone runs the fuel pump, and so don't switch it on. Do not top up with diesel to thin it: AdBlue doesn't mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of your tank, where your fuel is sucked from.
If you are at a forecourt, whether it is the Power- Old Town Service Station or the Esso, ask the staff to help roll the vehicle away from the petrol pump. On your own drive in East Dean? Then the car remains where it is.
Stop as soon as it is safe and switch off, if your engine has already run. On the M23, under 50 miles from East Dean, that means the next junction. Distance matters — a short hop across East Dean is a smaller job than driving under 25 miles towards Brighton and Hove — so say about how far it went.
When our technicians arrive in East Dean, what occurs?
Outside Pashley Down Infant School, near East Dean Village Hall or on your own drive: wherever your car has stopped, our technicians come to it. Those replies settle the work and the price, so our engineers ask what went in, about how much, and if it's run. Nobody heads out until you have heard the quote by phone.
After that: draining, then a full flush of the entire system. With AdBlue that counts more than with petrol: it crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it does not wash out on its own. The filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and the vehicle is tested. Next our technicians start the engine and make sure it runs properly before we leave.
If your motor 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. Your insurer will ask for the engineer's report and your VAT invoice, and both are yours once the job is done. Payment comes on the day, with no money upfront. Misfuelling cover is part of many insurance policies — and so make use of the wait to check yours.
About East Dean itself
East Dean is a small village in East Sussex, situated on the southeastern coast of England, with an elevation of around 49 metres. East Dean lies near the popular tourist spots of Birling Gap and the Seven Sisters, and is close to the villages of Friston and Crowlink. East Dean has a population of approximately 790 people, and its housing stock is predominantly made up of detached homes. East Dean is within commuting distance of Brighton and Hove, which is around 16 miles away.
AdBlue drains around East Dean, and East Sussex beyond
Throughout BN postcodes, the teams that cover East Dean — a coastal village — work the nearby places too, Birling Gap and Crowlink among them. Fastest of all: quote a BN20 0 postcode for the van.
No need to shift your car. Anywhere it sits — near St Simon & St Jude, on a lay-by en route to Eastbourne Downs Golf Club, at home — that is where it is cleared. If you are near a border, or somewhere hard to describe like the back of Church of St Mary the Virgin, ring and ask rather than assuming.
In short, for East Dean drivers
Before you tip, read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank all the same, leave the vehicle off then call 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it stands, anywhere around East Sussex.