How It Occurs and How to Prevent It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Farnborough
AdBlue already in your diesel tank? Then put this page aside a moment, keep your ignition and motor off, and ring 0333 366 0103. In Farnborough, catching it before your motor runs usually leaves a drain and a full flush on the spot. Reading in advance? In that case the rest covers why it comes about and how to stop it happening at all.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle, and its separate tank
Many newer diesels around Farthing Street, like those in Farnborough, carry on two fluids; your engine gets just your diesel. Its own tank holds it, and from there it is sent to the exhaust, where spraying cleans the gas.
Different tanks, different fillers. Many of vehicles have a single flap for both, while others put the AdBlue filler to the boot or under the bonnet. Filling your diesel side at the petrol pump goes on all the time. Much less often, the AdBlue side gets filled — mostly from a bottle, by a person thinking about where it goes. The mistake grows in the gap between the two.
Farnborough: how AdBlue in your diesel tank occurs
Carelessness rarely causes it. Instead is three things lining up together.
On a driveway off High Street before work, or in the car park outside The Change of Horses heading home: that is where the rushed top-up takes place. Why the rush? As AdBlue gets low the vehicle tells you, and once it's empty, limp mode follows.
Then the car is strange. A hire car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't, and the hand gets to for the cap it would have used on the old one.
Lastly, the bottle fits: diesel filler or AdBlue one, it slides in as readily, and once the pour begins, nothing halts it. It takes seconds, whether in Locksbottom or bang in the centre of Farnborough.
Telling the AdBlue filler from the diesel filler
Be it a Farnborough forecourt or a driveway out in Chelsfield, take a couple of seconds over these before anything is poured in.
- Blue and marking: an AdBlue cap is commonly blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap normally doesn't. Trust the cap, not where it sits.
- On many cars, the size tells: AdBlue gets the smaller filler neck.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Many motors say there which fuel goes where.
- In your boot or under the bonnet: that is where the filler is if it is not by the diesel cap, and the handbook tells you which.
- Collecting a hire or company car, say at the car park outside Orpington? Ask whoever drove it last before leaving, not when the light comes on.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach the diesel tank
When the light comes on, anywhere across Greater London, follow this routine.
- Stop somewhere level, motor off, with time to spare — not hurried on the side of Gladstone Road.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds silly and it does the trick.
- Leave your diesel cap on. If both sit under one flap, check the diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle.
- Using the bottle's own spout, tip slowly — and stop when it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Only then, start your car: close the cap, check once more, and make sure the diesel cap was never opened.
Find at the second or third step that the bottle went into the wrong tank? That's where you stop. Leave out stage five altogether.
Already put AdBlue in your diesel tank around Farnborough?
What follows is a short order of things, starting with no starting your motor. Keep the ignition off too, because on many diesels switching it on alone starts your pump. 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 attendants at Texaco, BP or another forecourt will usually lend a hand pushing the car away if you ask. Leave it where it is if you are on your own driveway in Farnborough.
Where your motor has been run by now, stop somewhere safe and turn the vehicle off. On the M25, under 3 miles from Farnborough, that means the next exit. Mileage matters — a short hop across Farnborough makes a smaller job than heading under 15 miles towards London — so tell us roughly how far it went.
Farnborough: what happens when we turn up
By Farnborough Primary School, near St. Giles Centre or on your own driveway: wherever your car has stopped, our technicians come to it. Both the work and our quote depend on three replies — what liquid, which amount, and if it's run — so our engineers ask. No one sets off before you've heard the price by phone.
The fuel system is then cleaned thoroughly, after your tank is emptied. With AdBlue that matters more than with petrol: it crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it doesn't wash out on its own. Testing comes last: before that, fresh diesel goes in, and the fuel filter is cleaned or replaced if necessary. Before we go, we fire it up and check that it's running correctly.
If the engine hasn't run, most jobs take about half an hour once we are there, using pumps that are fine on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night. Payment is on the day, not upfront, and you are given the paperwork an insurer wants: an engineer's report and a VAT invoice. It's worth checking your insurance while we travel to you: misfuelling cover is included with plenty of policies.
About Farnborough itself
Farnborough is a suburban area in Greater London, situated approximately 13 miles from central London and 106 metres above sea level. Farnborough is characterised by its semi-detached housing stock and is located near other suburban areas such as Locksbottom and Green Street Green. Farnborough has a population of around 4097 residents and is part of the wider London urban area.
AdBlue drains across Greater London, Farnborough included
Farnborough is a residential suburb, and the vans that cover it also work the places near it, Green Street Green and Crofton among them, across the BR postcode area. Our van reaches you fastest with a postcode starting BR6 7.
The vehicle stays where it is. Our technicians drain it where it is — a side street near St Giles the Abbot, a lay-by on the way to Church End Plantation, a driveway. Assuming doesn't help at the back of Bromley Tennis Centre, on a border, or somewhere awkward to pin down; phone and check.
In short, for Farnborough people
Read the cap before you pour. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it stands, anywhere in Greater London, if AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank all the same — and so leave the vehicle off then ring 0333 366 0103.