Why It Happens and How to Avoid It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Goodshaw
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave your engine and your ignition off and phone 0333 366 0103. Normally, if the engine hasn't run, it's drained and thoroughly purged where your vehicle sits around Goodshaw. The rest of this page explains why it takes place and how to make sure it does not — handy if you're reading ahead of time.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel motor
Plenty of newer diesels in Loveclough, like those in Goodshaw, carry on two liquids; your engine takes just the diesel. Your exhaust, not the motor, is where AdBlue ends up: dosed into the gas to fresh them, from its own tank.
Each tank comes with a filler of its own. Other cars keep the AdBlue filler in your boot or under the bonnet; plenty more place the two side by side behind one flap. Diesel goes in at every filling station visit, again and again. Someone who has to stop and work out where it goes normally tops up the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and far less frequently. It's in the gap that the error lives.
AdBlue in the diesel tank around Goodshaw: how it occurs
Three things tend to come together, and carelessness is seldom one of them.
To start with, the warning. Low AdBlue brings a message from the car, and letting it run dry leads to limp mode — hence a hurried top-up, perhaps before work off Burnley Road, perhaps outside The White Bull on the way home after work.
The old car's filler is where your hand reaches — yet a hire car, a new car or a company car puts the fillers elsewhere. That's a second thing: a new vehicle.
Lastly, the spout goes in: diesel filler or AdBlue one, it goes in as readily, and once the pour begins, nothing stops it. It's seconds, whether out in Crawshawbooth or right in the centre of Goodshaw.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Check these before pouring, on a forecourt in Goodshaw or a driveway over in Goodshaw Fold. Seconds, no more.
- Position can mislead; the cap does not. AdBlue ones tend to be blue or carry the word "AdBlue" — diesel caps usually don't.
- The size. On many vehicles the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- Look inside your fuel flap: plenty of motors have a label there saying which fuel goes where.
- In your boot or under the bonnet: that is where your filler is if it's not by your diesel cap, and the handbook says which.
- Ask the person who drove it last — before you leave, not when the light comes on — when you collect a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park at Hapton.
How to top up without AdBlue in the diesel tank
Wherever around Lancashire the light comes on, this is a routine for the day.
- Park then switch off. Not on a slope, not with the motor running, and not in a rush on the side of Turton Hollow Road.
- Find the AdBlue filler, check the cap, and speak the word "AdBlue" aloud as you unscrew it. It sounds silly. It works.
- The diesel cap remains on. Where the two sit under a flap, make sure it is closed before lifting the bottle.
- Using the bottle's own spout, tip slowly — and stop when it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Only after that, start your car: close the cap, check once more, and make sure your diesel cap was never opened.
If at stage two or three you find you have already poured into your diesel side, stop there. Never carry on to step five.
Goodshaw: already put AdBlue in your diesel tank?
What follows is a short order of things, starting with no starting the motor. Do not switch your ignition on; on plenty of diesels that alone runs the fuel pump. AdBlue does not mix with diesel — it sinks to the bottom of that tank, where your fuel is pulled from — so don't top up with diesel to dilute it.
On a forecourt — Shell, Tesco or another — the staff will usually help push the car away, if you ask. Leave it where it is if you're on your own driveway around Goodshaw.
Already run? Pull over once it's safe, then switch off. The next exit means the place to leave if you're on the M65, under 5 miles from Goodshaw. Mileage counts — a short hop across Goodshaw makes a smaller job than heading under 25 miles to Preston — so say about how far it went.
When we get there around Goodshaw, what happens?
Our engineers come to the car wherever it has stopped, whether that's outside Crawshawbooth Primary School, close to Goodshaw Baptist Church or on your own drive. Both the work and our quote rest on three replies — what liquid, which quantity, and if it's run — so our technicians ask. That quote is given on the call, ahead of any van leaving.
Next: draining, then a full flush of the whole system. Not like petrol, AdBlue leaves crystals and attacks some fuel-system metals, and none of that clears away by itself. That is why it matters more. Your filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and your car is tested. Your engine is fired up next and checked to confirm it runs smoothly, all before our technicians leave.
Most jobs are done in about half an hour after our engineers arrive, provided your engine has not run — and the pumps our engineers use are fine on a live forecourt and quiet at night beside a house. The insurer usually wants the engineer's report and your VAT invoice, and you get both at the end. Payment comes on the day, with no deposit. While we travel, take a look at your policy; many include cover for misfuelling.
About Goodshaw itself
Goodshaw is a suburban area in Lancashire, situated near the lakeside at an elevation of 246 metres. Goodshaw sits close to the communities of Crawshawbooth and Goodshaw Chapel, with Rake Foot nearby. Goodshaw is characterized by its predominantly terraced housing stock, reflecting its development as a residential area. Goodshaw is located 17.1 miles from Preston and 178.1 miles from London.
AdBlue drains in Goodshaw and across Lancashire
Goodshaw Chapel and Rake Foot are among the towns near Goodshaw, a residential suburb, that the same teams cover, throughout BB postcodes. A postcode starting BB4 8 gets the van to you fastest.
The vehicle does not need to shift. Anywhere it sits — beside St Mary & All Saints, in a lay-by heading to Old Hall Plantation, at home — that is where it gets cleared. If you are near a boundary, or somewhere hard to explain like the back of St Paul, ring and ask rather than assuming.
Goodshaw motorists: the short version
Read the cap before you pour. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it stands, anywhere around Lancashire, if AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank anyway — so leave it off and call 0333 366 0103.