Grassmoor: 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 your engine and the ignition off then phone 0333 366 0103. Around Grassmoor, finding it before the engine turns usually leaves a drain and a thorough flush on the spot. The rest of this page covers why it happens and how to make sure it does not — useful if you are reading before it has happened.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel motor
No single fluid but two: that is how many newer diesels near Grassmoor and Temple Normanton run, with diesel for your engine. Your exhaust, not the motor, is where AdBlue goes: sprayed into the fumes to clean them, from its own tank.
Each tank has its own filler. On a lot of motors the two sit side by side under the same flap; on others the AdBlue filler is in your boot or under the bonnet. The diesel side is filled at the petrol pump all the time. The AdBlue side is fuelled far less commonly, normally from a bottle, and normally by someone who has to stop and think where it goes. It is in the gap that the mistake happens.
AdBlue in your diesel tank around Grassmoor: how it happens
Three things tend to line up, and carelessness is seldom one of them.
On a drive off Chapman Lane before work, or in the car park outside The Sportsman on the way home: that is where the rushed top-up happens. What is the reason for the rush? As AdBlue runs low your car warns you, and once it is gone, limp mode kicks in.
Unfamiliar vehicles come next, as well. Hire cars, new cars and company vehicles put their fillers in new places, and habit reaches for the cap it used on the old one.
Lastly, the spout goes in: a diesel filler or AdBlue one, it goes in as readily, and after the pour starts, nothing stops it. Corbriggs or the heart of Grassmoor: it takes the same few seconds either way.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Be it a Grassmoor forecourt or a driveway over in Winsick, spend a few seconds over these before anything is poured in.
- Position can mislead; the cap doesn't. AdBlue caps are often blue or bear the word "AdBlue" — diesel ones usually do not.
- Plenty of cars fit AdBlue the smaller filler of the two.
- Check inside the fuel flap: plenty of vehicles have a label there showing which fuel goes where.
- The handbook says where it lives if the filler is not next to your diesel cap: your boot, or under the bonnet.
- Check with the person who drove it last — before you leave, not when the light comes on — if you collect a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park outside Chesterfield.
How to top up without AdBlue in your diesel tank
The day the light goes on, anywhere across Derbyshire, use this routine.
- Pull in on level, engine off, with time in hand — never hurried on the side of B6038.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, once you find the AdBlue filler and reading it. Silly, perhaps, but it does the trick.
- The two behind a single flap? So confirm the cap on the diesel filler stays shut ahead of raising the bottle.
- Using the bottle's own spout, pour slowly — and stop when it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Close the cap and check again. Make sure your diesel cap was never opened. Only then start the car.
Discover during the second or third stage that AdBlue went in the diesel tank? That is where you stop. Stage five is off limits.
Already put AdBlue in the diesel tank in Grassmoor?
The short order of things, beginning with no starting your motor. The fuel pump runs on many diesels the moment your ignition is switched on — so keep it off. AdBlue doesn't 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.
Ask the attendants to help roll the vehicle away from the petrol pump if you're on a forecourt — the the nearest petrol station, the The Co-operative or somewhere else. On your own drive around Grassmoor? Then the car stays where it is.
If your engine has already run, stop as soon as it is safe then switch off. Leave the M1 — under 3 miles out of Grassmoor — at the first exit. A short hop across Grassmoor is a smaller job than a run towards Sheffield, under 15 miles away, so tell us about how far it went.
When our engineers get there in Grassmoor, what takes place?
We come to the vehicle wherever it has stopped, whether that's outside Grassmoor Primary School, close to Grassmoor Methodist Church or on your own driveway. The answers settle this work and the price, so our technicians ask what got in, roughly how much, and whether it's run. The quote is given on the call, ahead of any van leaving.
The system is then purged thoroughly, once your tank is cleared. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, and so it does not wash out on its own — which is why that matters more here than with petrol. The filter flushed or, if needed, replaced; clean diesel in; then a test of your vehicle. We do not go until it has been fired up and is running correctly.
Unstarted cars mostly mean a half-hour job from the moment we arrive. The equipment is safe on a live forecourt, and quiet enough for a driveway late at night. 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 Grassmoor, briefly
Grassmoor is a village in Derbyshire, situated on the riverside at an elevation of 119 metres, with semi-detached housing being the predominant type of accommodation. Grassmoor lies approximately 13 miles from Sheffield and 128.6 miles from London, making it a relatively accessible rural community. Grassmoor is surrounded by nearby places such as Corbriggs, Milehill, and Tupton, and has a population of around 2771 residents. Grassmoor's location in the East Midlands region of England provides a scenic backdrop to the village.
AdBlue drains across Derbyshire, Grassmoor included
Being a village, Grassmoor has the same vans as surrounding places — Milehill, Tupton — all the way through S postcodes and the wider area beyond. Quickest of all: quote a S42 5 postcode for our van.
The car doesn't need to shift. Our engineers drain it where it is — a side street near Grassmoor Community Centre, a lay-by on the way to Barnes Park, a driveway. If you're close to a border, or somewhere hard to describe like the back of St John's Church, ring and ask instead of assuming.
The short version for Grassmoor motorists
Before you pour, read the cap. Even so AdBlue in the diesel tank? Petrol in Diesel will empty it wherever it is, wherever around Derbyshire: keep the vehicle off and phone 0333 366 0103.