AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Grange Farm: How It Happens and How to Prevent It
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave the motor and your ignition off then call 0333 366 0103. In Grange Farm, catching it before your motor runs usually means a drain and a full flush where it stands. If you are reading before it has happened, the remainder of this page is about why it takes place and how to make sure it does not.
AdBlue in a diesel car: two tanks, two fillers
Many newer diesels in Crownhill, like those in Grange Farm, run on two fluids; the engine takes only your diesel. Your exhaust, not the engine, is where AdBlue ends up: sprayed into the gas to fresh them, from a separate tank.
Every tank comes with one filler of its own. Some cars keep the AdBlue filler in your boot or under the bonnet; plenty of others place both side by side under one flap. Diesel goes in at each forecourt visit, again and again. Far less commonly, the AdBlue side gets topped up — mostly from a bottle, by a person working out where it goes. The mistake grows in the gap between the two.
How does AdBlue in your diesel tank happen in Grange Farm?
Carelessness rarely explains it. What does is three things coming up at once.
Haste comes from the warning. Your car warns you as AdBlue runs low, and an empty tank sends the vehicle into limp mode — so the top-up happens quickly, before work on a drive off Wickstead Avenue, or on the way home in the car park at Sportsmens Rest.
Then your 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 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 pour once it has started. The same few seconds decide it, in the middle of Grange Farm or out in Medbourne.
Which filler is for AdBlue, and which for diesel?
Check these first, on a forecourt around Grange Farm or a driveway out in Woodhill. A few seconds, that's all.
- Colour and lettering: an AdBlue cap is regularly blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap usually doesn't. Go by the cap, not its position.
- Many vehicles fit AdBlue the smaller filler of the two.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Plenty of motors say there which fuel goes where.
- Can't find it beside the diesel inlet? Then check below the bonnet or inside your boot — the owner's manual says which.
- Whoever had it before knows. Check when you collect a hire car or company car — from Milton Keynes Central's car park, say — rather than once the light comes on.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching the diesel tank
When the light comes on, anywhere around Buckinghamshire, follow this routine.
- Switch off after you park — flat ground, motor stopped, and never rushed by Tandy Rise at the roadside.
- Daft as it sounds, saying "AdBlue" out loud while you unscrew the cap does the trick — once you've located your filler and read the cap.
- Leave your diesel cap on. If both sit under one flap, check the diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle.
- Pour slowly, using the bottle's own spout. Stop when it's full or when the bottle is empty.
- Only then, start the 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. Step five stays out.
Grange Farm: already put AdBlue in the diesel tank?
The short order of things, beginning with no starting the motor. The fuel pump starts on plenty of diesels the moment your ignition goes on — and so leave it off. Topping up with diesel will not dilute it: instead, AdBlue sinks to the bottom of that tank, right where the fuel is taken from.
If you are on a forecourt, whether it is the Morrisons or the BP, ask the staff to help roll the vehicle away from the petrol pump. If you're on your own drive in Grange Farm, leave it where it stands.
Where the motor has been run by now, stop safely and turn the vehicle off. The next exit is where to come off if you are on the M1, under 5 miles from Grange Farm. A short hop across Grange Farm is a smaller job than a run towards Milton Keynes, under 3 miles away, so tell us roughly how far it went.
Our arrival in Grange Farm, and what takes place next
We come to your car wherever it has stopped, whether that's outside Christ the Sower Ecumenical Primary School, near Seedlings Children's Centre or on your own drive. What fluid went in, the amount, and whether it ran: our engineers ask since the answers decide both work and price. During the call itself, you are told the price — before dispatch.
Next: draining, then a thorough flush of the entire system. Not like petrol, AdBlue leaves crystals and attacks certain fuel-system metals, and none of it clears out by itself. Hence it matters more. After the filter has been flushed — or replaced, where required — fresh diesel goes in, and finally the car gets tested. Your engine is fired up next and tested to be sure it runs correctly, all before our engineers leave.
If the engine has not run, most jobs take about half an hour once we're there, using pumps that are fine on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night. The insurer usually wants an engineer's report and the VAT invoice, and you get both once this job is done. Payment is on the day, with no deposit. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it's worth checking yours while we're on the way.
About Grange Farm itself
Grange Farm is a suburban area located in Buckinghamshire, situated approximately 2.7 miles from Milton Keynes and 46.1 miles from London. Grange Farm sits at an elevation of 109 metres, surrounded by nearby places such as Medbourne, Hazeley, and Oakhill. Grange Farm is characterised by its predominantly detached housing stock, which reflects the area's residential development. Grange Farm has a population of around 6129 residents, making it a sizeable suburban community.
AdBlue drains around Grange Farm and across Buckinghamshire
Grange Farm is a residential suburb, and the vans that cover it also work the places around it, Hazeley and Oakhill among them, across the MK postcode area. Give a postcode beginning MK8 0, and the van gets there fastest.
Shifting the vehicle isn't needed. Wherever it stands — beside Crownhill Meeting Place, in a layby en route to Hazeley Wood, at home — that is where it gets emptied. Ring and ask instead of assuming if you are close to a boundary, or somewhere hard to explain, like the back of Oakhill Moat.
For Grange Farm drivers, the short version
Tip no AdBlue until you have read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank anyway, leave it off and phone 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel empties it where it waits, anywhere across Buckinghamshire.