AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Eldon Lane: How It Happens and How to Stop It
AdBlue already in your diesel tank? In that case set this page aside for now, leave the ignition and engine off, and call 0333 366 0103. In Eldon Lane, finding it before the motor runs normally leaves a drain and a thorough flush on the spot. If you're reading before it has happened, the rest of this page is about why it happens and how to make sure it doesn't.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle, and its separate tank
Not one liquid but two: that is how plenty of newer diesels around Eldon Lane and Oak Street run, with diesel for your motor. AdBlue goes to your exhaust, where it is sprayed into the gas to clean it, and it lives in a tank of its own.
Separate tanks, separate fillers. On a lot of vehicles the two sit side by side under the same flap; on others the AdBlue filler is in the boot or under the bonnet. Diesel gets filled at each filling station visit, again and again. The AdBlue side is filled far less regularly, normally from a bottle, and usually by somebody who has to stop and think where it goes. Mistakes happen in that gap between them.
How does AdBlue in your diesel tank happen around Eldon Lane?
Carelessness rarely explains it. Instead is three things lining up together.
First, the warning. Low AdBlue brings a message from the car, and running dry means limp mode — so a hurried top-up, perhaps before work off High Street, perhaps outside Queen's Head on the way home after work.
Then the vehicle is unfamiliar. A hire car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers where your last one did not, and the hand hits for the cap it would have 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 tip once it has started. Whether it occurs in Gray Street or the middle of Eldon Lane, it is the same few seconds.
Telling the AdBlue filler from your diesel filler
Be it a Eldon Lane forecourt or a drive out in Beech Terrace, spend a couple of seconds on these before anything goes in.
- Colour and marking: an AdBlue cap is commonly blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap usually doesn't. Trust the cap, not where it sits.
- The size. On plenty of vehicles the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- A label inside the fuel flap often says which fuel goes where, on plenty of cars. Check for it.
- The handbook says where it lives if the filler is not next to the diesel cap: your boot, or under the bonnet.
- Ask 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 at Shildon.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching your diesel tank
The day the light goes on, wherever around Durham, use this routine.
- Pull in on level, engine off, with time to spare — never rushing on the side of Millbank Terrace.
- Silly as it sounds, speaking "AdBlue" aloud while you unscrew the cap works — after you've located your filler and read the cap.
- If both sit under one flap, check the diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — then leave the vehicle on.
- Gently does it, through the bottle's own spout, till it is full or the bottle runs out.
- Only then, start the car: close the cap, check again, and make sure the diesel cap was never opened.
Stop there if you find, at stage two or three, that you have already poured into the diesel side. Do not go on to stage five.
Already put AdBlue in your diesel tank around Eldon Lane?
Brief order, then. First: the engine remains off. The fuel pump starts on many diesels the moment the ignition goes on — and so keep it off. AdBlue doesn't mix with diesel — it sinks to the bottom of your tank, where your fuel is sucked from — so do not top up with diesel to thin it.
On a forecourt — JET, Asda or any other — the attendants will normally help roll your car away, when you ask. On your own drive around Eldon Lane? Then the vehicle stays put.
Already started? Pull over when it's sensible, then switch off. Come off the A1(M) — under 10 miles out of Eldon Lane — at the first exit. A short hop across Eldon Lane is a smaller job than a run towards Durham, under 10 miles away, so tell us about how far it went.
When our engineers get there around Eldon Lane, what happens?
Our van comes to your car anywhere it stopped — your own driveway, beside St Mark's Church, or by Prince Bishops Community Primary School. Both the work and our price rest on three answers — which fluid, what quantity, and if it's run — so our technicians ask. During the call itself, you are told our quote — before dispatch.
Emptying your tank comes next, followed by a thorough flush of the fuel system. With AdBlue that matters more than with petrol: it crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, and so it doesn't wash out on its own. A test comes last: before that, fresh diesel is added, and the filter is cleaned or changed as needed. We do not leave until it has been fired up and is running properly.
Most jobs are finished in roughly half an hour after our technicians arrive, as long as the motor has not run — and the pumps our engineers use are fine on a live forecourt yet quiet after dark outside a house. Paying is on the day, not upfront, and you are given the documents an insurer wants: an engineer's report and a VAT invoice. Wrong-fuel cover is included in plenty of insurance policies — and so use the wait to look at yours.
About Eldon Lane and where it is
Eldon Lane is a small village in County Durham, situated inland at an elevation of around 105 metres. Eldon Lane lies approximately 9.6 miles from the city of Durham and is characterized by predominantly terraced housing. Eldon Lane is part of a network of nearby residential areas, including Gray Street, Lime Terrace, and Regent Street. Eldon Lane has a population of around 819 residents.
AdBlue drains round Eldon Lane, and Durham beyond
Throughout DL postcodes, the vans that cover Eldon Lane — a rural village — work the nearby locations too, Regent Street and Lime Terrace among them. Our van gets to you fastest with a postcode starting DL14 8.
There's no need to move the car. Our technicians drain it where it is — a side street close to The Valley Methodist Church, a lay-by on the way to Shildon Millennium Green, a driveway. If you are close to a boundary, or somewhere hard to describe like the back of Eldon Community Centre, ring and ask rather than guessing.
For Eldon Lane motorists, the short version
Pour no AdBlue until you have read the cap. AdBlue in the diesel tank regardless? Keep it switched off and call 0333 366 0103; Petrol in Diesel empties it where it stands, throughout Durham.