Elmers End: AdBlue in the Diesel Tank? Leave It Off
If AdBlue has got into the diesel tank, leave the engine off and keep your ignition off. Urea dissolved in water is all AdBlue is. Unlike fuel, it neither ignites nor blends, and nothing starts until the motor pulls it through. In Elmers End, AdBlue in a diesel tank caught before your engine runs usually comes down to a drain and a thorough flush, just where the vehicle is. Before you do anything else, call 0333 366 0103.
Elmers End, AdBlue in the diesel tank: what to do straight away
To do:
- Remove your keys, and that prevents anyone switching the electrics on.
- If you're at all close to moving traffic, put the hazards on.
- Keep the till receipt or the empty bottle, so you can tell us what went in and about how much.
- Call us from where you are. A postcode starting BR3 4, or the name of the closest street, gets the van to you without a search.
Don't:
- Not even for a second, and not to shift the car: the engine stays off.
- The ignition remains off: on many diesels, turning it on is enough to run the fuel pump.
- AdBlue doesn't dilute in diesel — it separates out — so adding extra diesel will not weaken it.
- Even a short distance along Mackenzie Road is too far to drive it.
- Do not try to drain the vehicle yourself at the kerbside.
On a forecourt in Elmers End, whether it's the JET or another one, ask the attendants to help you roll your car clear of the pump. At home, your car remains just as it is.
AdBlue in a diesel tank, and what it does there
Not your engine but the exhaust is where AdBlue is meant to go. It goes into its own tank and is sprayed into your exhaust gas to clean it. A fuel pump isn't made to cope with it, and AdBlue was never intended to travel through one.
Poured in with the diesel, it stays apart rather than blending — quite unlike fuel. It is heavier than diesel, so it sinks and collects at the bottom of that tank, which is where the pickup sucks fuel from. A vehicle topped up on a driveway in Beckenham overnight and not started since counts as the straightforward case. Nothing has pulled the AdBlue up so far — but when your engine turns, that is what goes first, directly from the bottom of that tank.
It does two kinds of harm from there. As its water goes, the urea left behind crystallises, and the crystals block filters and settle in fine passages. And it is corrosive to some of the metals a fuel system is made from, and so it keeps working on the parts it gets to for as long as it remains there. Overnight, a car sitting in Elmers End with AdBlue through its pipework gets worse; where it's only inside the tank, nothing changes. The water in it causes harm of its own: the high-pressure pump and your injectors depend on diesel to lubricate them, and water offers them nothing.
Petrol or AdBlue in a diesel: why AdBlue is often worse
Petrol put into a diesel on Shell's forecourt makes your fuel watery — that's the main issue. Harm only comes from running on it. Mixed into your diesel and left in the tank, it does none.
AdBlue in a diesel is another matter: not thin fuel, but no fuel at all. It cannot simply be run through, because it doesn't burn. Whether your vehicle sits in Crystal Palace or the centre of Elmers End, turning it over "to see" does more harm in this case than almost any other error, and the flush counts for more. The reasons: it will not remain mixed, so diluting it fails; and deposits and corrosion survive the following tankful.
With AdBlue, the good news is no distinct from petrol. Wherever across Greater London the car has stopped, an unstarted engine means the AdBlue still in the reservoir: the simplest bit of any fuel system to clear.
AdBlue in a diesel tank around Elmers End: how it ends up there
It's not on purpose. Plenty of vehicles have the AdBlue inlet alongside the diesel inlet, occasionally under one flap, and mixing them up is simple after dark. It usually occurs outside the house, from a bottle grabbed on the journey home, not at the filling station.
It tends to occur in a couple of familiar ways. Rushing, outside Stewart Fleming Primary School, after a warning lamp came on during the school run, someone tops up your car. A bottle is poured in at the end of the day on a drive just off Birkbeck Road. Another pattern: dim light, a pub car park by Grace's, and someone using that flap the first time.
It comes up most in a hire car, a new car, a company motor, or the other car in a family with both fuels — the vehicles drivers know least. Wherever in Greater London, Elmers End included, the slip does not change, and nor does the first step: keep it switched off.
Started the motor with AdBlue in your diesel tank in Elmers End?
The AdBlue has left the tank, then. With any running, it travels to the injection pump and every injector, having passed via the filter and lines.
Perhaps returning from Rose Garden, or part way across Elmers End, your motor might run lumpy, smoke, lose pace, flash your dash or stall. Stop when safe. Turn off. Keep the car off rather than testing it again. With each start, more of it is pulled through.
Elmers End lies under 10 miles from the M25; if you were on it, exit at the first junction and stop somewhere safe instead of driving on.
Mileage counts: every mile carries the AdBlue deeper into the system, and so driving towards Westminster, under 10 miles away, gives a far larger job than hopping across Elmers End to the car park by Dinosaur. Approximately how far had it come? Tell us.
Once the motor has run, the flush includes more, and all of it is done where your car has stopped. Long-term damage is very unusual if it's noticed soon.
Elmers End: how AdBlue is emptied from a diesel
Wherever it has stopped around Elmers End — a forecourt, a layby, a drive, a street beside Saint Michael's Beckenham Church — our van comes to your vehicle. The work rests on three replies, and our engineers get first — which fluid was put in, the amount, and whether the motor has turned over.
The contaminated diesel and the urea leave together after your tank is drained, on the spot. What remains from AdBlue will not flush out unaided, and so the fuel system gets a full flush, which matters much more with urea than for petrol. Clean diesel goes in after the fuel filter is cleaned — or swapped, if it needs to be — and then your car is tested. If the motor hasn't run, most jobs take about half an hour once our technicians arrive. The equipment is explosion-proof, so a busy filling station is no problem, and it's hushed enough for a residential street late at night.
The last step is to prime the system on clean diesel. After that our technicians start it and you drive off, whether from a parking space at Birkbeck or a drive around Elmers End. It's checked on fresh diesel to make sure it runs properly before our technicians leave. Our engineers do it all wherever the vehicle has ended up, and it never has to be taken to a garage. Your insurer is likely to want an engineer's report and your VAT invoice — both yours afterwards.
About Elmers End itself
Elmers End is a suburban area in south London, situated near several lakes and parks, with a mix of terraced housing and local amenities. Elmers End has a population of around 10886 people and is located about 7.7 miles from central London. Elmers End is close to neighbouring areas such as Anerley, Penge, and South Norwood, and its elevation is approximately 41 metres above sea level. Elmers End is also near Westminster, which is about 7.3 miles away.
AdBlue drains across Greater London, Elmers End included
Throughout the BR postcode area, the teams answering AdBlue jobs in Elmers End serve much of Greater London as well, Anerley, Penge and South Norwood among them. Ring and ask instead of guessing when you're close to a county line, or somewhere tricky to pin down.
Wherever the vehicle stands — a driveway at home, a residential street, a car park, a forecourt — we empty it on the spot, and there's no need to take it to us; which suits Elmers End, a residential suburb, well.
What AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to put right around Elmers End
Since the callouts differ, a single price would not be fair. Whether the engine has been running, and for how long, comes first in what changes the cost. How much AdBlue went in comes next, and then the location of the car, since an open drive is easier for our van to reach safely than a tight spot behind St Anthony of Padua Catholic Church.
That is why each call from Elmers End starts with the same three queries, asked before giving a figure, not after: what was put in, how much, and whether it's run. Given them, a range narrows to a single firm number.
The quote is quoted during the call, before a van leaves; payment comes on the day, by card or over the phone, with nothing upfront. Check your policy whilst we're on the way: plenty carry misfuelling cover.
In Elmers End and still alongside the car?
Then, the best thing to do with your vehicle is to leave it. Keys out, engine off, ignition off. Call 0333 366 0103: AdBlue, roughly how much, and if the engine ran is all our technicians ask. Petrol in Diesel handles the remainder across Greater London, Elmers End included.