Why It Happens and How to Prevent It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Great Crakehall
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 Great Crakehall, catching it before your motor runs usually means a drain and a full flush on the spot. 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 doesn't.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel car
Plenty of modern diesels on the roads about Great Crakehall and Langthorne carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to your motor. AdBlue goes to your exhaust, where it is sprayed into the gas to clean it, and it lives in a tank of its own.
Different tanks, different fillers. Under one flap, next to each other: that's the layout on many motors. On others, AdBlue's filler sits under the bonnet or in the boot instead. Diesel gets filled at every filling station call-out, again and again. Much less regularly, the AdBlue side is filled — mostly from a bottle, by someone thinking about where it goes. Mistakes happen in that gap between the two.
Great Crakehall: how AdBlue in your diesel tank occurs
Carelessness seldom causes it. Instead is three things coming up at once.
Hurry comes from the warning. The car tells you as AdBlue runs low, and an empty tank puts it into limp mode — so the top-up happens quickly, before work on a driveway off A684, or heading home in the car park outside The Bay Horse Inn.
New-to-you cars are next, too. Rentals, new motors and company motors place their fillers in new places, and the hand goes for the cap it used on the old one.
Nothing stops the pour once it has started, because a bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as readily as an AdBlue one. The bottle fits. It takes a few seconds, whether out in West End or right in the centre of Great Crakehall.
Which filler is for AdBlue, and which for diesel?
Check these before pouring, at a forecourt around Great Crakehall or a driveway over in Patrick Brompton. Seconds, no more.
- Read the cap rather than going by position: AdBlue ones are frequently blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel ones normally aren't.
- On plenty of motors, size gives it away: AdBlue gets the smaller filler neck.
- A label inside the fuel flap frequently shows which fuel goes where, on many vehicles. Look for it.
- The handbook. If your filler isn't by the diesel cap, it's in your boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- The person who drove the car last. On a hire or company car picked up from somewhere like the car park at Northallerton, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
Keeping AdBlue out of your diesel tank when you top up
On the day the warning appears — wherever you are across North Yorkshire — a simple routine to follow.
- Pull in somewhere level, engine off, with time to spare — never hurried on the side of St Gregorys Close.
- Locate the AdBlue filler, read the cap, and speak the word "AdBlue" out loud while unscrewing it. It sounds daft. It does the trick.
- The diesel cap stays on. When both sit under a flap, confirm it's shut before lifting the bottle.
- Gently is best, through the bottle's own spout, till it is full or the bottle runs out.
- Close the cap and check again. Make sure your diesel cap was never opened. Only then start the vehicle.
Find during the second or third step that the bottle went in the wrong filler? That is where you stop. Never carry on to step five.
Great Crakehall: already put AdBlue in the diesel tank?
Then the order of things is short. Don't start your engine. Do not switch your ignition on; on plenty of diesels that alone runs the fuel pump. Filling up with diesel will not dilute it: instead, AdBlue sinks to the base of that tank, right where fuel is taken from.
At a forecourt — Crakehall Filling Station, another forecourt nearby or any other — the staff will usually help push the car away, if you ask. If you are on your own drive in Great Crakehall, leave it where it is.
When the motor has been run by now, pull over safely and turn it off. Come off the A1(M) — under 3 miles out of Great Crakehall — at the first junction. A short hop across Great Crakehall is a smaller job than a run towards Ripon, under 15 miles away, so tell us roughly how far it went.
When our technicians turn up around Great Crakehall, what happens?
Outside Crakehall Church of England Primary School, close to St Gregory's or on your own drive: wherever the car has stopped, our technicians come to it. Both the work and the quote depend on three replies — what fluid, which amount, and whether it's run — so we ask. You get that quote by phone, before anybody sets off.
Draining the tank comes next, followed by a thorough flush of the system. Much more than with petrol, it counts with AdBlue: the crystals form, some metals corrode, and none of it clears away on its own, however long it is left. Testing is last: before that, clean diesel goes in, and the fuel filter is flushed or changed as needed. We don't leave until it has been fired up and is running properly.
With pumps safe on a busy forecourt and quiet enough for use outside a house at night, most jobs where your motor hasn't run take roughly half an hour after our technicians arrive. The insurer will ask for an engineer's report and the VAT invoice, and both are yours once the job is done. Payment is on the day, with no deposit. Wrong-fuel cover is part of plenty of insurance policies — and so use the wait to look at yours.
About Great Crakehall
Great Crakehall is a village situated on the riverside in North Yorkshire, with a population of around 644 people. Great Crakehall has a mix of housing types, but detached homes are the most common, and it is located near other small settlements like West End and Little Crakehall. Great Crakehall sits at an elevation of 55 metres, close to the city of Ripon, which is 12.3 miles away. Great Crakehall is also within a reasonable distance of major cities, being 203.1 miles from London.
Great Crakehall and North Yorkshire: AdBlue drains across the area
Little Crakehall and Kirkbridge are among the places around Great Crakehall, a village, that the same teams cover, over DL postcodes. Quote a postcode beginning DL8 1, and our van gets there quickest.
There's no need to move the vehicle. Anywhere it sits — beside Crakehall Hall, in a layby heading to Little Crakehall Park, on a drive — that's where it is drained. Guessing doesn't help behind White Cross, on a boundary, or somewhere awkward to pin down; ring and ask.
For Great Crakehall drivers, the short version
Before you tip, read the cap. Petrol in Diesel empties it on the spot, anywhere around North Yorkshire, if AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank regardless — so leave it off and ring 0333 366 0103.