AdBlue in the Diesel Tank in Folkestone? Keep It Switched Off
With AdBlue in your diesel tank, the ignition stays off and so does the motor. Chemically, AdBlue is simply urea in water. Unlike fuel, it neither burns nor mixes, and nothing starts till the engine sucks it round. A drain and a thorough flush, done where the vehicle is around Folkestone, is normally all AdBlue in a diesel tank takes — if it is caught before your engine has been run. First, call us on 0333 366 0103.
Those opening minutes: AdBlue in your diesel tank in Folkestone
To do:
- Remove your keys, and that stops someone turning the electrics on.
- If you are at all near moving traffic, put the hazard lights on.
- Which product, and roughly what quantity? Save the bottle or the till receipt, and we can know.
- Call us from where you are. A postcode starting CT20 1, or the name of the closest street, brings the van to you without a search.
Things not to do:
- Not even for a second, and not to shift your vehicle: your motor stays off.
- Many diesels power their fuel pump the moment the ignition comes on, and so keep the vehicle off.
- No more fuel added. The AdBlue won't mix, so it is pointless.
- Even a short way along Shellons Street is too far to drive it.
- Do not try to drain the car yourself at the roadside.
The attendants working at any Folkestone filling station — the Tram Road Service Station among them — will normally lend a hand pushing it clear if you ask. On that drive, the car remains just as it is.
What AdBlue does in a diesel tank
AdBlue is made for your exhaust, not your engine. Its own tank holds it, and from there it's sprayed into the exhaust, where it treats the gas. Nothing in it is meant to pass through a fuel pump, and nothing in a fuel pump is built to handle it.
Inside a diesel tank it acts really differently from fuel. It doesn't mix in. The intake sucks fuel from the lowest part of the tank, and that's just where AdBlue ends up: being denser than diesel, it sinks. A motor filled on a driveway in Sandgate yesterday evening and left unstarted is the simple one. Nothing has pulled the AdBlue up yet — though when the engine turns, that's what goes first, directly from the bottom of that tank.
It does two kinds of harm from there. It eats at certain metals used in fuel systems, attacking any part it reaches until it is cleared completely. And once the water goes, the urea turns into crystals that clog filters and lodge in narrow channels. A vehicle left standing around Folkestone with AdBlue already in its lines is worse by the morning; one with AdBlue just in its tank isn't. Water protects nothing. The injection pump and every injector depend on diesel flowing through them, so the water part harms them by itself.
Why AdBlue in a diesel is frequently more serious than petrol
Fill a diesel with petrol in error at the Sainsbury's, and this issue is thinned fuel. Blended through the diesel and left still, it is no threat for now; using your motor is the damage.
AdBlue in a diesel is another matter: not thin fuel, but no fuel at all. It can't just be run through, since it does not burn. Nor can it be thinned, since it splits again — and the following tankful won't clear away crystals or corrosion. So the flush counts for more with AdBlue, and turning your key "to see", in the heart of Folkestone or out in Cheriton, costs more than almost any other slip.
As with petrol, there is good news. Clearing a tank is the easiest part on a fuel system, and with no start-up, the AdBlue stays in there — wherever around Kent the car sits.
How AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank around Folkestone
Many cars put the AdBlue filler beside the diesel cap, now and then under one flap, and after dark the two can appear identical. Nobody means it. A bottle picked up while heading home and tipped in at home, rather than at the filling station, is the typical story.
A few familiar ways account for the majority of them. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up occurs in a hurry outside St Eanswythe's Church of England Primary School. Someone pours the container in outside their house, just off Foresters Way, as the day ends. Otherwise, in dim light by The Samuel Peto, your vehicle is refilled by a driver using that flap for the first time.
It crops up most in a rental, a brand-new motor, a fleet car, or the other car in a family with one of each fuels — the vehicles drivers use the least. Wherever you are in Folkestone or the rest of Kent, it's the same error and the same first answer: leave it off.
Folkestone: started the engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank?
Then the AdBlue has left the tank. Via your filter, along the lines, and — with any running — on to the high-pressure pump and each injector: that's how far it has gone.
Maybe coming back from Payers Park, or midway across Folkestone, the motor might run rough, smoke, drop pace, light up your dash or cut out. No restarting to test: stop when it is safe, then turn everything off. More of it is pulled through with each start.
On the M20, under 3 miles from Folkestone, the first junction is where to leave, and anywhere sensible is where to stop — not driving on.
Mileage matters: every mile carries the AdBlue deeper in, and so driving for Canterbury, under 15 miles away, makes a much larger job than hopping across Folkestone to the car park by Grace Chapel. Tell us roughly how far it had come.
Once the engine has run, the flush covers more, and all of it is done where the car has come to a stop. Very rarely does it leave permanent damage if it's spotted early.
What draining AdBlue from a diesel involves in Folkestone
Anywhere it has stopped around Folkestone — a forecourt, a lay-by, a drive, a road by Folkestone Library (CURRENTLY CLOSED) — our van travels to the car. Before anything else our technicians ask what went in, roughly how much, and if your engine has run, because those answers decide the work.
Then your tank is drained where your car waits, and so the tainted fuel and the AdBlue come out together. The fuel system is cleaned thoroughly, which counts more with AdBlue than with petrol, since what it leaves behind doesn't rinse out on its own. Clean diesel goes in after your filter is flushed — or replaced, when it needs to be — and after that the car is tested. Most of these jobs are a half-hour visit once we arrive, if your motor hasn't run. Explosion-proof pumps mean a live forecourt sensible to work on, and they run quiet enough to spare the street at night.
The last step is to bleed the fuel system on fresh diesel. You set off as soon as our engineers have fired it up, and it makes no difference whether the car is on a drive around Folkestone or in a space at Folkestone Central. Before we leave, our technicians check it's running correctly with clean diesel in. Since the job is done in its entirety where the car is, a garage never comes into it. Your insurer is likely to want an engineer's report and your VAT invoice — each handed over afterwards.
About Folkestone, for a moment
Folkestone is a town situated on the coast of Kent, overlooking the English Channel. It is nestled in a valley, surrounded by cliffs, at the southern edge of the North Downs. The town has a rich history as a significant port and a popular seaside destination. Folkestone's scenic location has made it a notable spot in south-east England.
AdBlue drains across Kent, Folkestone included
Over the CT postcode area, the teams answering AdBlue jobs in Folkestone serve much of Kent as well, Foord, Coolinge and Morehall included. Guessing doesn't help close to a county line or anywhere hard to pin down; ring and check.
Folkestone is a coastal town, and an on-site drain suits it: whether the vehicle is on a home drive, a residential street, a car park or a forecourt, our technicians drain it where it stands, so it never needs to be moved to us.
AdBlue in a diesel tank around Folkestone: the cost of fixing it
No flat figure would be honest, since every job differs. Whether the engine has run, and for how long, comes first in what moves the price. How much AdBlue went in comes next, and then the position of your car, because an open driveway is simpler for a technician to get to safely than a tight gap behind Folkestone Library.
Before a figure, not afterwards, every enquiry from Folkestone begins with the same three questions: the liquid, the amount, and if it ran. Once those are known, a range turns into one fixed number.
Before anyone sets off, you hear our quote on the phone. Then you pay on the day, by card or by phone, with nothing upfront. Misfuelling cover is part of plenty of insurance policies, so it is worth looking at yours before the van arrives.
In Folkestone and still beside the vehicle?
Then the most helpful thing you can do is nothing to your car. Keys out, engine off, ignition off. Call 0333 366 0103: AdBlue, the amount, plus if the engine ran is everything our engineers need. Petrol in Diesel takes over the remainder across Kent, Folkestone too.