AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Hadham Cross: How It Happens and How to Avoid It
Stop here for a moment if the diesel tank already has AdBlue in it: ignition off, engine off, then phone 0333 366 0103. Caught before your motor runs, it is normally a drain and a thorough flush, done where the car is around Hadham Cross. If you are reading before it has happened, the rest of this page is about why it happens and how to make sure it does not.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle, and its separate tank
Many modern diesels on the roads round Hadham Cross and Green Tye carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to the motor. Your exhaust, not the engine, is where AdBlue goes: dosed into the fumes to fresh it, from a separate tank.
There is a filler on each tank. Plenty of vehicles share a single flap for the two, whereas others put the AdBlue filler to your boot or under the bonnet. The diesel side is filled at the pump all the time. Someone who has to stop and work out where it goes usually tops up the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and far less commonly. The mistake lives in that gap.
AdBlue in your diesel tank in Hadham Cross: how it happens
It's seldom carelessness. Three things tend to line up.
To start with, the warning. Low AdBlue brings a message from your car, and running dry leads to limp mode — so a hurried top-up, perhaps before work off Malting Lane, or at The Bull Inn on the way home that evening.
Unfamiliar motors come next, too. Rentals, new motors and company cars place their fillers in new places, and habit reaches for the cap it used on the old one.
A spout-topped bottle finds no obstacle at a diesel filler any more than at an AdBlue one. So the pour, once begun, carries on. The same few seconds decide it, in the middle of Hadham Cross or out in Kettle Green.
Telling the AdBlue filler from the diesel filler
Whether a Hadham Cross forecourt or a drive out in South-end, spend a few seconds on these before any is poured in.
- Colour and lettering: an AdBlue cap is frequently blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap usually does not. Trust the cap, not its position.
- The size. On many vehicles the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Plenty of cars say there which fuel goes where.
- The handbook. If the filler isn't by your diesel cap, it's in your boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- Whoever had it before knows. Ask when you collect a hire car or company car — from Bishops Stortford's car park, perhaps — not once the light appears.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach your diesel tank
Anywhere around Hertfordshire the light comes on, this is a routine for the day.
- Switch off once parked — level ground, engine off, and never in a rush beside Kettle Green Lane on the verge.
- Daft as it sounds, saying "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap works — after you have found your filler and read it.
- The two under one flap? Then make sure the lid on your diesel filler is still shut before raising the bottle.
- Finish once that tank fills or the bottle runs dry; until then, pour slowly through the own spout.
- Shut the cap, then look again — confirm your diesel cap remained shut the whole time. Only then, start the car.
Find at the second or third stage that AdBlue went into the wrong filler? That is where you stop. Don't carry on to stage five.
AdBlue in the diesel tank already, around Hadham Cross?
Do not start your motor: that's how the short order of things begins. On many diesels your ignition alone runs the fuel pump, so don't switch it on. Filling up with diesel will not thin it: rather than mixing, AdBlue sinks to the base of that tank, right where the fuel is taken from.
Ask the staff to help push the vehicle clear of the pump if you're on a forecourt — the the nearest petrol station, the Pace or somewhere else. If you are on your own drive in Hadham Cross, leave the car where it sits.
If the engine has already run, stop as soon as it is safe then switch off. Leave the M11 — under 5 miles out of Hadham Cross — at the next exit. Distance counts — a quick hop across Hadham Cross makes a smaller job than heading under 25 miles towards St Albans — so tell us about how far it went.
Our arrival in Hadham Cross, and what occurs next
Our van reaches the vehicle anywhere it has come to rest — your own driveway, near Much Hadham Forge Museum, or outside St Andrew's CE Primary School and Nursery. Our engineers ask what went in, roughly how much, and if it's run, because those answers determine this work and the quote. No one heads out until you've heard the quote by phone.
Emptying your tank comes next, then a full flush of the fuel system. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, and so it doesn't wash out on its own — which is why the flush matters more with AdBlue than with petrol. Once the filter is cleaned — or renewed, if required — fresh diesel is added, and finally the vehicle gets tested. Before we go, our technicians fire it up and confirm that it's running properly.
Most jobs are finished in roughly half an hour after our technicians arrive, as long as your motor has not run — and the pumps our engineers use are fine on a busy forecourt and quiet at night beside a house. No money in advance; you settle up that day. At the end, the VAT invoice and the report from the engineer go to you for the insurer. It's worth looking at your policy as the van travels to you: misfuelling cover is included with plenty of policies.
About Hadham Cross and where it is
Hadham Cross is a village situated on the riverside in Hertfordshire, with a mix of rural and village landscapes. Hadham Cross has a population of around 1328 people and is characterized by predominantly detached housing. Hadham Cross is located near other villages such as Kettle Green and Perry Green, and is close to the larger village of Much Hadham. Hadham Cross sits at an elevation of 62 metres, within the Eastern region of England.
AdBlue drains about Hadham Cross, and Hertfordshire beyond
Perry Green and Much Hadham are among the towns near Hadham Cross, a village, that the same teams cover, over SG postcodes. Our van reaches you fastest with a postcode starting SG10 6.
The vehicle does not need to shift. Our technicians drain it where it is — a side street near Much Hadham Village Hall, a lay-by on the way to Much Hadham Sports Association, a driveway. If you're near a border, or somewhere hard to explain like the back of St Thomas, ring and ask instead of assuming.
The short version for Hadham Cross people
Tip no AdBlue till you have read the cap. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it stands, anywhere across Hertfordshire, if AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank regardless — so leave the car off and phone 0333 366 0103.