Emery Row: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Avoid It?
AdBlue already in your diesel tank? Then put this page aside for now, leave your ignition and motor off, and ring 0333 366 0103. In Emery Row, finding it before the motor turns normally means a drain and a full flush on the spot. The remainder of this page explains why it happens and how to make sure it does not — useful if you are reading ahead of time.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel vehicle
Many modern diesels on the roads round Emery Row and Ashby St Ledgers carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to the engine. Kept in a tank of its own, AdBlue is sprayed into the exhaust gas to clean it.
Each tank comes with one filler of its own. Many of motors have a single flap for both, whereas some put the AdBlue filler to your boot or under the bonnet. Diesel goes in on each filling station visit, again and again. Much less regularly, the AdBlue side gets topped up — mostly from a bottle, by someone thinking about where it goes. That gap is where the error lives.
How does AdBlue in your diesel tank happen in Emery Row?
Three things tend to come together, and carelessness is rarely one of them.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low the vehicle tells you, and if it runs out altogether, the vehicle goes into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a drive off Malt Green before work, or in the car park at The George on the way home.
The old car's filler is where the hand goes — yet a rental car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers elsewhere. That's the second thing: an unfamiliar car.
No part halts the pour after it has started, since a bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one. The bottle fits. Whether it takes place in Kilsby or the middle of Emery Row, it's the same few seconds.
The AdBlue filler and the diesel filler: telling them apart
A few seconds is all the checks take — so check them before you tip anything, on a driveway in Crick or a forecourt in Emery Row.
- Read the cap rather than going by position: AdBlue ones are regularly blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel ones usually are not.
- The size. On many cars the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Plenty of cars say there which fuel goes where.
- The handbook. If the filler isn't by the diesel cap, it's in your boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- The person who drove it last. On a hire or company car picked up from somewhere like the car park outside Rugby, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach your diesel tank
On the day the warning comes on — anywhere you are around Northamptonshire — a simple routine to use.
- Switch off once parked — flat ground, motor stopped, and never rushed by Maltmill Close on the verge.
- Silly as it sounds, saying "AdBlue" out loud while you unscrew the cap works — after you've located the filler and read the cap.
- If both sit under one flap, check your diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — and leave the car on.
- Slowly does it, through the bottle's own spout, till it's full or the bottle runs out.
- Before you start your car, close the cap and check a second time that your diesel cap was never opened off.
Stop there if you find, at step two or three, that you've already poured into the diesel side. Do not go on to step five.
AdBlue in your diesel tank already, in Emery Row?
Short list, then. Top of it: the engine remains unstarted. On many diesels your ignition alone runs the fuel pump, and so don't switch the vehicle on. Do not top up with diesel to dilute it: AdBlue does not mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of your tank, where your fuel is pulled from.
The staff at EG On the Move, BP or another forecourt will usually lend a hand pushing your car clear when you ask. Leave it where it is if you are on your own driveway around Emery Row.
If the engine has already run, stop as soon as it is safe and switch off. On the M45, under a mile from Emery Row, that means the next junction. A short hop across Emery Row is a smaller job than a run towards Coventry, under 15 miles away, and so tell us roughly how far it went.
When our engineers turn up around Emery Row, what occurs?
Outside Kilsby Church of England Primary School, near Kilsby United Reformed Church or on your own drive: wherever the car has stopped, we come to it. We ask what got in, about how much, and whether it's run, since the answers decide the work and the quote. No one sets off before you've heard the price by phone.
After that: draining, then a thorough flush of the whole system. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it doesn't wash out on its own — which is why the flush counts more with AdBlue than with petrol. The filter flushed or, if it must be, replaced; clean diesel in; and then a check of the car. Next our technicians start it and check it runs correctly before leaving.
Unstarted cars mostly need a half-hour job from the moment we arrive. The equipment is safe on a busy filling station, and quiet enough for a driveway late at night. Paying happens on the day, not upfront, and you receive the paperwork your insurer wants: an engineer's report and a VAT invoice. It is worth looking at your insurance as the van travels to you: misfuelling cover comes with many policies.
About Emery Row
Emery Row is a small locality in Northamptonshire, situated on the riverside at an elevation of around 135 metres. Emery Row lies near the villages of Kilsby, Barby Nortoft, and Barby, and is approximately 14.9 miles from Coventry. Emery Row has a population of around 612 people, with predominantly detached housing. Emery Row is also within commuting distance of London, being around 72.5 miles away.
AdBlue drains across Northamptonshire, Emery Row included
Over CV postcodes, the teams covering Emery Row — a small village — work the surrounding places too, Barby and Barby Nortoft included. A postcode starting CV23 8 gets the van to you fastest.
Moving your car isn't necessary. A driveway, a lay-by on the way to Kilsby Playing Field, a side street close to St Faiths: our engineers drain the car where it stands. Assuming doesn't help behind Kilsby Tennis Club, close to a boundary, or anywhere hard to describe; phone and ask.
Emery Row people: the short version
Pour nothing until you have read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank all the same, leave the car off and phone 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel empties it where it sits, anywhere across Northamptonshire.