Flookburgh: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Avoid It?
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave the motor and your ignition off and phone 0333 366 0103. Around Flookburgh, catching it before the motor runs normally means draining and a full flush on the spot. Reading in advance? In that case what follows explains how it happens and what to prevent it ever happening.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel vehicle need its own filler?
Diesel goes to your engine — but many modern diesels seen round Flookburgh and Allithwaite hold another liquid as well. AdBlue goes to the exhaust, where it is sprayed into the gas to fresh it, and it lives in a tank of its own.
Different tanks, different fillers. Under one flap, side by side: that's the layout on a lot of motors. On others, AdBlue's filler sits under the bonnet or in the boot instead. The diesel side is topped up at the petrol pump all the time. Much less frequently, the AdBlue side is filled — normally from a bottle, by someone thinking about where it goes. That gap is where the slip lives.
Flookburgh: how AdBlue in the diesel tank occurs
Three things tend to line up, and carelessness is rarely one of them.
On a drive off Main Street before work, or in the car park at Hope & Anchor heading home: that is where the hurried top-up takes place. What is the reason for the rush? As AdBlue gets low the car tells you, and once it is empty, limp mode follows.
Then your car is new. A hire car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't, and your hand reaches 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. The same few seconds decide it, in the middle of Flookburgh or out in Ravenstown.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Before you tip anything, whether on a drive in Cartmel or a forecourt around Flookburgh, check these. They take a couple of seconds.
- Where it sits can mislead; the cap doesn't. AdBlue caps tend to be blue or bear the name "AdBlue" — diesel ones normally don't.
- Many cars fit AdBlue the smaller filler of the two.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Many motors say there which fuel goes where.
- Cannot find it beside your diesel inlet? Then check below the bonnet or in the boot — the handbook will say which.
- The previous driver knows. Check when you pick up a hire car or company car — from Cark's car park, perhaps — rather than once the light comes on.
How to top up without AdBlue in your diesel tank
Wherever around Cumbria the light comes on, this is a routine for that day.
- Not in a rush on the side of Market Street, not on a slope, not with the motor running: park and switch off first.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds daft and it does the trick.
- If both sit under one flap, check your diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — then leave the car on.
- Using the bottle's own spout, tip slowly — and stop when it is full or the bottle is empty.
- Only after that, start the car: close the cap, check again, and make sure the diesel cap was never opened.
If at step two or three you find you have already poured into your diesel side, stop there. Do not go on to stage five.
Put AdBlue in your diesel tank around Flookburgh already?
Then the order of things is short. Do not start your engine. On many diesels your ignition alone runs the fuel pump, and so do not switch the vehicle on. Do not top up with diesel to thin it: AdBlue doesn't mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of your tank, where your fuel is pulled from.
On a forecourt — BP, Gulf or any other — the staff will normally help push the car clear, if you ask. Leave it where it is if you're on your own drive in Flookburgh.
If your engine has already run, stop as soon as it is safe and switch off. The next exit is the place to leave when you're on the M6, under 10 miles from Flookburgh. About how far did it go? Crossing Flookburgh is smaller a job than a trip of under 15 miles towards Lancaster, so say.
Our arrival in Flookburgh, and what happens next
Our engineers come to your car wherever it has stopped, whether that is outside Flookburgh CofE Primary School, near Flookburgh War Memorial or on your own driveway. Our engineers ask what got in, roughly how much, and whether it has run, because those replies settle the work and the quote. You get that price by phone, before anybody sets off.
Your system is then rinsed thoroughly, once your tank is emptied. Not like petrol, AdBlue forms crystals and attacks certain fuel-system metals, and none of that clears away by itself. Hence it counts more. The filter flushed or, where needed, replaced; clean diesel in; and then a test of the car. Next we start the engine and make sure it runs correctly before leaving.
Unrun cars mostly mean a half-hour job after the moment we arrive. The kit is safe on a busy forecourt, and hushed enough for a residential street after dark. You pay on the day, with nothing upfront, and get a VAT invoice and an engineer report for your insurer. Misfuelling cover is included in many insurance policies — so make use of the wait to check yours.
About Flookburgh and where it is
Flookburgh is a small coastal village in Cumbria, situated near the estuary of the River Leven, with Ravenstown, Cark, and Holker nearby. Flookburgh has a population of around 962 people and is characterized by semi-detached housing. Flookburgh sits at a low elevation of 18 metres above sea level, close to the shores of Morecambe Bay. Flookburgh is located approximately 11 miles from Lancaster and 219 miles from London.
Flookburgh and Cumbria: AdBlue drains across the area
Cark and Holker are among the towns around Flookburgh, a coastal village, that the same teams cover, throughout LA postcodes. Fastest of all: give a LA11 7 postcode for the van.
Shifting the vehicle is not needed. Our engineers drain it where it is — a side street close to St John The Baptist, a lay-by on the way to Holker Hall Gardens, a driveway. Ring and ask instead of assuming if you are close to a border, or somewhere hard to explain, like the back of Lakeland Miniature Village.
For Flookburgh people, the short version
Read the cap before you tip. Even so AdBlue in your diesel tank? Petrol in Diesel can drain it wherever it is, anywhere in Cumbria: keep the car off then ring 0333 366 0103.