Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Forty Green
With AdBlue in the diesel tank, your ignition stays off and so does the motor. AdBlue is urea dissolved in water. As it is water-based, it will not burn and won't blend with diesel; trouble only starts once the pump begins drawing it. A drain and a thorough flush, done where the car is in Forty Green, is generally what AdBlue in a diesel tank takes — if it's caught before the engine has run. No step comes before calling 0333 366 0103.
AdBlue in your diesel tank in Forty Green: the first few minutes
Things to do:
- Keys out — then nobody can switch anything on.
- Put the hazards on if you're anywhere close to moving traffic.
- The empty bottle or your receipt tells us the product and the amount, so do not throw it away.
- Ring us from where you are. A postcode starting HP9 1, or the name of the nearest street, gets the van to you without a search.
Things not to do:
- Moving your car even a short way is no reason to fire up your motor.
- Your ignition stays off: on many diesels, turning it on is enough to run your fuel pump.
- AdBlue does not dilute in diesel — it separates out — so adding more fuel won't thin it.
- Leave the vehicle where it is rather than driving it anywhere, even a short distance down Holtspur Lane.
- Do not try to drain the car yourself at the kerbside.
The attendants working at any Forty Green filling station — the Esso among them — will normally help pushing it aside if you ask. If you are on your own drive, leave the vehicle just where it is.
What AdBlue does in a diesel tank
Not the engine but your exhaust is where AdBlue is meant to go. Kept in a dedicated tank, it's squirted into the exhaust stream to clean the gases. A fuel pump is not designed to take it, and AdBlue was never intended to go through one.
Inside a diesel tank it acts very differently from fuel. It doesn't mix in. The intake sucks fuel from the lowest part of your tank, and that is exactly where AdBlue settles: as it is denser than diesel, it sinks. A motor topped up on a drive in Wooburn Moor overnight and not started since is the straightforward case. No pump has sucked the AdBlue up so far — but once your engine turns, that's what is pulled first, straight from the bottom of that tank.
Once it is drawn in, the damage takes two forms. It attacks certain metals found in fuel systems, attacking any part it reaches till it's removed completely. And when the water evaporates, the urea forms crystals that block filters and lodge in narrow channels. By daybreak, a car parked in Forty Green with AdBlue through its pipework gets worse; if it is just inside the tank, nothing changes. And there's the water: it offers no lubrication to the parts that need it most — the high-pressure pump and every injector.
AdBlue in a diesel: why it's often worse than petrol
Fill a diesel with petrol by mistake over at the Shell, and this problem is thinned fuel. Blended into your diesel and left unused, it's no threat at that stage; running your motor does the harm.
With AdBlue in a diesel, the liquid as such is simply the wrong one. Because it doesn't burn, running it through isn't an option. Whether your vehicle sits in Loudwater or the centre of Forty Green, firing it up "to see" costs more in this case than almost any other error, and the flush counts more. The reasons: it won't remain mixed, and so diluting it is impossible; and crystals and corrosion survive the following fill.
The good news is the same as with petrol. If the motor hasn't run, the AdBlue is still inside that tank, and your tank is the simplest part of a fuel system to clear, wherever across Buckinghamshire the car is sitting.
How does AdBlue end up in a diesel tank around Forty Green?
It is not deliberate. Many cars have the AdBlue inlet alongside the diesel one, occasionally behind a single flap, and muddling them up is simple in poor light. It mostly takes place at home, from a bottle grabbed on the journey home, rather than at the forecourt.
The ways it takes place are few and familiar. The top-up is rushed outside Holtspur School & Pre-School, because the dash lit up with a warning while the children were taken in. A bottle is poured in at the end of the day on a drive just off Forty Green. Else, in dim light by The Royal Standard of England, the car gets refilled by a driver opening that flap the first time.
Hired motors, brand-new cars, fleet vehicles, or the second car in a family with one of each: the least familiar vehicles see it the most. Wherever you're around Forty Green or the rest of Buckinghamshire, it's the same slip and the same first answer: leave the vehicle off.
AdBlue in your diesel tank in Forty Green, and the engine started?
Then the AdBlue has left the tank. It has been sucked through your filter and your lines, and if the engine ran for any time, it has reached the high-pressure fuel pump and your injectors.
Rough running, smoke from the exhaust, lost power, dashboard lights or cutting out: any might show up, maybe midway across Forty Green or coming back from Hogback Wood. Stop as soon as it is safe, switch off, and don't restart it to check. More of it is pulled through with each start.
On the M40, under 3 miles from Forty Green, the next junction is where to exit, and anywhere sensible is where to stop — not carrying on.
A quick hop across Forty Green to the car park by Sir Terry Pratchett, OBE is one matter; heading for St Albans, under 25 miles away, is something else, since every mile carries the AdBlue deeper in. So distance matters. Tell us about how far it had come.
There's more to rinse out once your engine has been started, and our engineers do all of it where the vehicle has ended up. If it's spotted early, permanent damage is very rare.
What emptying AdBlue from a diesel involves in Forty Green
The car stays put, whether that's a street near Beaconsfield Library, a driveway, a layby or a filling station in Forty Green, and the van travels to it. What went in, roughly the quantity, and if the motor has turned over: we check before all else, because those shape the work.
The contaminated diesel and the urea come out together after the tank is drained, on the spot. The system is purged thoroughly, which counts more with AdBlue than with petrol, since what it leaves behind doesn't rinse out on its own. Next, the fuel filter: cleaned, or replaced when it must be. After that clean diesel, then a test of the vehicle. If your engine hasn't run, most jobs take about half an hour once our engineers are there. The pumping gear is explosion-proof, so a busy filling station is no problem, and it's quiet enough for a residential street after dark.
The final step is to bleed the fuel system on new diesel. At that point our technicians start the car and you drive off, whether from a parking space at Beaconsfield or a driveway in Forty Green. It's tested on clean diesel to be sure it runs smoothly before our technicians go. Since the job is done in full where the vehicle is, a garage never comes into it. Insurers want a VAT invoice and an engineer report, and you get both afterwards.
About Forty Green and where it is
Forty Green is a small suburban area in Buckinghamshire, situated inland at an elevation of around 101 metres. Forty Green lies approximately 24 miles west of London and is close to the nearby places of Knotty Green, Holtspur, and Beaconsfield. Forty Green is characterised by its predominantly detached housing stock, reflecting its development as a residential area. Forty Green remains a quiet and relatively small community with a population of around 729 residents.
Forty Green and Buckinghamshire: AdBlue drains across the area
The teams that answer AdBlue calls around Forty Green also cover the locations around it, Knotty Green, Holtspur and Beaconsfield among them, and most of Buckinghamshire beyond, across the HP postcode area. Ring and ask rather than guess when you're by a county line, or somewhere tricky to pin down.
A mobile service suits Forty Green, a residential suburb: you have no need to bring your vehicle to us, because our technicians empty it on the spot, on a drive, a side street, a parking area or a filling station.
Forty Green: what AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to fix
Because the callouts differ, a single figure would not be fair. What shifts the cost is, first, whether the motor has run and for how long; then how much AdBlue was put in; and finally where your car is and whether a van can get to it safely, which is simpler on an open driveway than in a tight gap behind Hope Church.
That is why every call from Forty Green starts with the same three queries, asked before giving a figure, not after: what got in, how much, and whether it has run. Their answers narrow the range right down to one figure.
You hear that price on the phone, before anyone sets off, and you pay on the day, by card or by phone, with nothing upfront. Look at your policy whilst we're on the way: plenty include misfuelling cover.
In Forty Green and still beside your car?
Right now, the best thing to do with your car is to leave it. Keys out; engine and ignition off. Petrol in Diesel takes over the remainder, in Forty Green or anywhere within Buckinghamshire, once you ring 0333 366 0103 saying it was AdBlue, about how big an amount, and if the engine ran.