AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Emsworth? Don't Start It
AdBlue in the diesel tank? Then leave the engine off — and the ignition too. Urea mixed in water is what AdBlue is. It doesn't burn, it doesn't mix with diesel, and the harm it does begins when your fuel system pulls it in. Caught before your motor has been run, AdBlue in a diesel tank is generally a drain and a thorough flush, done where the vehicle is around Emsworth. Before you do anything else, call 0333 366 0103.
Your next steps straight away, Emsworth: AdBlue in the diesel tank
Do these:
- Keys out — that way nobody can switch anything on.
- Hazards on, if moving traffic is at all near.
- So you can give us which liquid it was and roughly how much, keep the till receipt or the empty bottle.
- Ring just where you are. Quote a PO10 7 postcode or the nearest street sign, and no one has to hunt for you.
Do not:
- No starting your motor — not for a second, not to reposition the vehicle.
- Do not switch your ignition on. On many diesels that alone runs the fuel pump.
- No more fuel on top. The AdBlue won't blend, so it's pointless.
- Never drive the car anywhere, not even a short stretch up North Street.
- No draining it yourself, at all, at the roadside.
Get the attendants to help you roll your vehicle off the island if you are on a forecourt in Emsworth, whether it's the Harvest Energy or somewhere else. Parked on your own driveway? Then it stays just as it is.
AdBlue in a diesel tank: what it does
The engine is not what AdBlue is made for; your exhaust is. From a dedicated reservoir it is fed straight to your exhaust, treating what the engine emits. A fuel pump is not made to cope with it, and AdBlue was never supposed to go through one.
Fuel blends; AdBlue, once poured in, will not. The behaviour is nothing like fuel's. Denser than diesel, it sinks and pools below it — the very spot the pickup draws from. A car filled on a drive in Prinsted overnight and not started since counts as the straightforward case. No pump has pulled the AdBlue up yet — but when the engine runs, that's what goes first, straight from the bottom of the tank.
It causes two kinds of damage from there. Crystals and corrosion. As the water evaporates, it leaves urea that crystallises in filters and narrow channels; meanwhile, because it attacks some metals, every part it reaches keeps suffering for as long as it stays inside. By daybreak, a car parked in Emsworth with AdBlue in its lines gets worse; if it's only in the tank, it doesn't. Then there's the water: it brings no protection to the components that need it the most — the injection pump and every injector.
AdBlue in a diesel: why it's regularly worse than petrol
Petrol pumped into a diesel on Shell's forecourt makes the fuel watery — that is the whole fault. It mixes with your diesel, and while it's in that tank it causes no harm; the damage comes from running the motor on it.
AdBlue in a diesel is another matter: not thin fuel, yet no fuel at all. It doesn't burn, so it can't just be run through. Nor can it be thinned, because it splits back out — and the next tankful will not rinse away deposits or corrosion. So the flush matters for more with AdBlue, and trying the engine "to see", in the centre of Emsworth or out in Warblington, does more harm than nearly any other slip.
As with petrol, there is good news. Emptying a tank is the simplest job on any fuel system, and without running, the AdBlue stays in there — anywhere in Hampshire your car sits.
Emsworth: how AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank
Many vehicles place the AdBlue filler alongside the diesel cap, now and then under one flap, and in dim light the two may look identical. Nobody means it. A bottle picked up while heading home and tipped in outside the house, rather than at the filling station, is the usual story.
Mostly, it occurs in one of a few familiar ways. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up happens in a hurry outside Emsworth Primary School. In the evening, a container goes in on a driveway near Main Road. Or your car is topped up in the car park at The Crown, in poor light, by somebody who has never opened that flap before.
Hired vehicles, brand-new cars, company vehicles, or the second vehicle in a home with one of each: the least known cars see it the most. Wherever across Hampshire, Emsworth included, the slip doesn't change, and neither does the first step: leave it switched off.
AdBlue in the diesel tank around Emsworth, and the engine started?
The AdBlue has left your tank, then. The filter and lines have had it pulled along, and some running time carries it on to the high-pressure pump and every injector.
Maybe returning from Brook Meadow, or part way across Emsworth, the motor might go lumpy, smoke, lose power, light up your dash or stall. When you safely can, stop and turn it off — with no turning it on again to see. With each start, more of that is pulled through.
If you were on the A3(M), under 5 miles from Emsworth, come off at the next junction and stop somewhere sensible instead of pressing on.
Hopping across Emsworth to the car park by Emsworth Museum is one thing; driving for Chichester, under 10 miles away, is another, since every mile carries the AdBlue further in. So distance matters. Let us know about how far it had come.
Our technicians do all of the cleaning where your car has come to a stop, and once your engine has been started there is more of it. Noticed soon, it very seldom leaves lasting damage.
Emsworth: how AdBlue is drained from a diesel
Our technicians come to the car, wherever it has stopped around Emsworth: a side street near Emsworth Library, a drive, a lay-by or a forecourt. Which fluid went in, about how much, plus if the motor has turned over: we check first, because those decide the job.
On the spot, that tank is then drained, and both the polluted diesel and the urea come out at once. With AdBlue, far more than with petrol, the flush matters: the whole system is cleaned right through since what remains will not flush out by itself. Clean diesel goes in once the filter is flushed — or swapped, if it needs to be — and then your car is tested. Not run? Then expect about half an hour once we are there for most jobs. Quiet enough to use outside a house at night, and fine on a working forecourt, the pumps are explosion-proof.
Lastly, your system is primed with new diesel. Then our engineers fire it up and you set off, whether from a parking bay at the nearest station or a drive in Emsworth. The check before we head off is that it runs properly on clean diesel. The whole job is done where the car is, so it never has to be taken to a workshop. You receive a VAT invoice and an engineer report later, which is what insurers want.
About Emsworth itself
Emsworth is a coastal town in Hampshire, situated on the shore of Chichester Harbour. Emsworth has a population of around 9644 people and is characterised by predominantly detached housing. Emsworth sits at a low elevation of 9 metres, close to the nearby settlements of Lumley, New Brighton, and Westbourne. Emsworth is located near the city of Chichester, approximately 6.9 miles away, and is about 57.5 miles from London.
AdBlue drains around Emsworth and across Hampshire
The vans that answer AdBlue call-outs in Emsworth also cover the spots about it, Lumley, New Brighton and Westbourne among them, and most of Hampshire beyond, across the PO postcode area. If you're close to a border, or somewhere hard to explain, ring and ask instead of guessing.
A van that comes to you suits Emsworth, a coastal town: there's no need to take your car to us, since our engineers drain it there, on a driveway, a residential street, a parking area or a filling station.
What does AdBlue in a diesel tank cost to sort out in Emsworth?
No single figure could be honest, because each job differs. What changes the price is, first of all, whether your engine has run and for how long; then how much AdBlue got in; and finally where the car is and whether a van can reach it safely, which is simpler on an open driveway than in a tight spot behind Emsworth Slipper Sailing Club.
Which fluid was put in, what quantity, and whether the engine ran: every Emsworth enquiry opens with precisely those, ahead of a figure, never afterwards. Those replies turn a range into a straight price.
Before anyone sets off, you are told our price on the phone. And you pay on the day, card or by phone, with nothing in advance. While our engineer is on the way, check your policy: many cover misfuelling.
Alongside the car around Emsworth, right now?
Then, the most helpful thing to do with your vehicle is to not touch it. Ignition off, engine off, keys out. Tell us it's AdBlue, about what quantity, and whether the engine ran, on 0333 366 0103. After that Petrol in Diesel handles it, across Emsworth or wherever within Hampshire.