Why It Happens and How to Prevent It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Greenhill
Keep the motor and ignition off then ring 0333 366 0103 now — the rest can wait when AdBlue is already in your diesel tank. A drain and a thorough flush, carried out right where the vehicle sits in Greenhill, is normally what it needs when caught before your motor runs. Nothing happened yet? Below, the rest of the page explains the reasons it happens and the ways to avoid it altogether.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle, and its separate tank
Plenty of modern diesels on the roads around Greenhill and Offmore Farm carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to your motor. Kept in a tank of its own, AdBlue is sprayed into the exhaust stream to clean it.
There's a filler for each tank. Under one flap, next to each other: that is the layout on many cars. Elsewhere, AdBlue's filler sits beneath the bonnet or in your boot instead. Topping up your diesel side at the petrol pump goes on constantly. Rarely filled, AdBlue usually goes in out of a bottle, poured by a driver who must stop and think which filler it needs. It's in that gap that the slip lives.
AdBlue in your diesel tank in Greenhill: how it occurs
Carelessness seldom causes it. Instead is three things coming up together.
To start with, the warning. Low AdBlue brings a message from the car, and running out means limp mode — so a rushed top-up, perhaps before work off Batham Road, perhaps at Land Oak on the way home after work.
Next, your hand goes for the cap it would have used on the old vehicle — because a rental car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers somewhere your last one did not.
A spout-topped bottle meets no resistance at a diesel filler any more than at an AdBlue one. And so the pour, once begun, carries on. It takes seconds, whether out in Broadwaters or bang in the centre of Greenhill.
Telling the AdBlue filler from the diesel filler
Whether a Greenhill forecourt or a drive out in Kidderminster, take a couple of seconds on these before anything goes in.
- Colour and marking: an AdBlue cap is regularly blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap usually does not. Trust the cap, not its position.
- Many vehicles give AdBlue the smaller neck of the two.
- Look inside the fuel flap: plenty of vehicles have a label there saying which fuel goes where.
- The handbook. If your filler isn't by your diesel cap, it is in the boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- Whoever had it before will know. Check when you collect a rental or company car — from Kidderminster's car park, perhaps — rather than when the warning appears.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching the diesel tank
Wherever around Worcestershire the light comes on, here is a routine for that day.
- Park and switch off. Not on a slope, not with your motor running, and not in a rush on the side of Vine Street.
- Find the AdBlue filler, check the cap, and say the word "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds silly. It does the trick.
- The diesel cap stays on. Where the two share a flap, make sure it's closed before lifting the bottle.
- Slowly is best, through the bottle's own spout, until it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Only after that, start the car: close the cap, check once more, and make sure your diesel cap was never opened.
Spot at stage two or three that it's already gone into the diesel side? So stop just there. Skip step five entirely.
Greenhill: already put AdBlue in your diesel tank?
The short order of things, starting with no starting your engine. On many diesels the ignition alone runs the fuel pump, so do not switch it on. Filling up with diesel won't dilute it: instead, AdBlue drops to the bottom of the tank, right where the fuel is taken from.
Ask the staff to help roll your car clear of the pump if you are on a forecourt — the Texaco, the Sainsbury's or somewhere else. At home around Greenhill? Then the vehicle stays where it is.
Stop as soon as it is safe then switch off, if the engine has already run. The next exit is the place to leave when you're on the M5, under 10 miles from Greenhill. Tell us roughly how far it went: a run towards Wolverhampton, under 15 miles away, is a bigger job than a short hop across Greenhill.
When our technicians arrive around Greenhill, what happens?
We come to the car wherever it has stopped, whether that's outside St George's CofE School, near St Oswald's Church Centre or on your own drive. We ask what went in, roughly how much, and whether it has run, because those answers decide this work and our price. Nobody sets off until you've heard our price over the phone.
The fuel system is then flushed thoroughly, once your tank is cleared. Unlike petrol, AdBlue forms crystals and eats at some fuel-system metals, and none of it clears out unaided. That is why it matters more. The filter is flushed, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and the vehicle is tested. Before we leave, we fire it up and confirm that it is running properly.
If your motor hasn't run, the majority of jobs take about half an hour once we are there, using pumps that are fine on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night. The insurer usually wants an engineer's report and your VAT invoice, and both are yours once the job is done. Payment is on the day, with no deposit. It is worth checking your insurance as the van travels to you: misfuelling cover is included with many policies.
About Greenhill
Greenhill is a suburban area in Worcestershire, situated inland at an elevation of 72 metres, with semi-detached housing being the predominant type of accommodation. Greenhill lies approximately 13.8 miles from Wolverhampton and 108.6 miles from London, placing it in the wider West Midlands region. Greenhill is surrounded by nearby places such as Broadwaters, Hurcott Village, and Hurcott, and has a population of around 6508 residents. Greenhill forms a residential community with a mix of local amenities and services.
AdBlue drains across Worcestershire, Greenhill included
Hurcott Village and Hurcott are among the towns near Greenhill, a residential suburb, that the same teams cover, over DY postcodes. Our van gets to you fastest with a postcode starting DY10 2.
Your car does not need to shift. Our technicians drain it where it is — a side street near The Rose Theatre, a lay-by on the way to Broadwaters Park, a driveway. Ring and ask rather than assuming if you are near a boundary, or somewhere hard to explain, like the back of Our Lady of Ostra Brama.
For Greenhill drivers, the short version
Read the cap before you tip. Even so AdBlue in your diesel tank? Petrol in Diesel can empty it wherever it is, wherever around Worcestershire: switch it off then ring 0333 366 0103.