AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Harleston: Why It Happens and How to Avoid It
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave the engine and the ignition off and phone 0333 366 0103. A drain and a full flush, done just where your car sits around Harleston, is usually all it takes when found before your engine runs. Not happened yet? Below, the rest of the page covers the why it occurs and the ways to prevent it altogether.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle: two tanks, two fillers
Diesel goes to the engine — yet plenty of current diesels seen around Harleston and Needham carry another fluid too. Kept in a tank of its own, AdBlue is sprayed into the exhaust gas to clean it.
Every tank comes with one filler of its own. Many of vehicles have a single flap for both, while others move the AdBlue filler to the boot or under the bonnet. At the pump, your diesel side gets filled constantly. Rarely filled, AdBlue normally comes out of a bottle, poured by someone who must stop and think what cap to use. That gap is where the mistake lives.
How does AdBlue in your diesel tank occur around Harleston?
Carelessness seldom causes it. What does is three things coming up at once.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low the car tells you, and if it runs out altogether, the car goes into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a drive off The Thoroughfare before work, or in the car park at The Cap on the way home.
Then, the hand goes for the cap it would have used on the old car — because a rental car, a new car or a company car places the fillers somewhere your last one didn't.
A spouted bottle meets no resistance at a diesel filler any more than at an AdBlue one. So the pour, after started, carries on. It's a few seconds, whether out in Lushbush or bang in the heart of Harleston.
Telling the AdBlue filler from your diesel filler
Be it a Harleston forecourt or a drive out in Mendham, spend a few seconds on these before any goes in.
- Check the cap instead of going by where it sits: AdBlue ones are often blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel ones normally aren't.
- On many vehicles, size tells: AdBlue has 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 is not by the diesel cap, it is in your boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- Collecting a hire or company car, perhaps at the car park at Diss? Check with the person who drove the car last before you set off, rather than once the light goes on.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching the diesel tank
For the day the light comes on — wherever you are in Norfolk — a simple routine to use.
- Not in a rush on the side of Swan Lane, not on a slope, not with the engine running: park and switch off first.
- Locate the AdBlue filler, read the cap, and speak the name "AdBlue" aloud as unscrewing it. It seems daft. It does the trick.
- Leave the diesel cap on. If both sit under one flap, check your diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle.
- Stop when your tank is topped up or the bottle runs dry; until then, pour slowly using the own spout.
- Shut the cap, and look again — making sure the diesel filler remained shut throughout. Only then, start your car.
Find at stage two or three that it's already gone into your diesel side? Then stop just there. Stage five stays out.
Already put AdBlue in your diesel tank in Harleston?
The short order of things, beginning with no starting the motor. Do not switch your ignition on; on many diesels that alone runs the fuel pump. Do not top up with diesel to dilute it: AdBlue doesn't mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of that tank, where the fuel is pulled from.
At a forecourt — Shell, another forecourt nearby or any other — the staff will normally help push the car away, if you ask. Your own driveway in Harleston is the place it should stay.
Stop as soon as it is safe then switch off, if your engine has already run. Harleston lies over 50 miles from the M11; on it, use the next junction. About how far did it go? Hopping across Harleston is smaller a job than a run of under 25 miles to Norwich, and so say.
What takes place when our engineers arrive in Harleston
By Mendham Primary School, close to Awards or on your own drive: wherever the vehicle has stopped, our engineers come to it. Both the work and our quote depend on three replies — which liquid, which amount, and whether it's run — so our engineers ask. No one heads out until you have heard our quote by phone.
Next: draining, then a thorough flush of the whole system. Unlike petrol, AdBlue forms crystals and eats at certain fuel-system metals, and none of that clears away by itself. That is why it counts more. Filter cleaned or, where it must be, replaced; fresh diesel in; then a test of the car. Then our technicians fire it up and confirm it runs properly before we leave.
If the engine has not run, most 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 after dark. No money in advance; you settle up on the day. Afterwards, a VAT invoice and a report from the engineer go to you for your insurer. Before we get there, have a look at your insurance documents; plenty include cover for misfuelling.
About Harleston itself
Harleston is a small town in south Norfolk, situated inland at an elevation of 29 metres, approximately 15.7 miles south of Norwich. Harleston has a population of around 5257 people, with a predominance of semi-detached housing. Harleston is close to several nearby villages, including Lushbush, Starston, and Redenhall, and is about 86.7 miles from London.
AdBlue drains about Harleston, and Norfolk beyond
Throughout IP postcodes, our teams that cover Harleston — a town — work the surrounding spots too, Redenhall and Starston included. Quote a postcode that starts IP20 9, and our van arrives quickest.
Your car does not need to move. The drain takes place on the spot, be it a driveway, a street by Harleston Village Sign, or a layby on the way to Starston Glebe Meadow. Ring and ask rather than guessing if you are near a boundary, or somewhere hard to describe, like the back of Saint John the Baptist Church.
In short, for Harleston motorists
Before you pour, read the cap. Petrol in Diesel drains it on the spot, anywhere in Norfolk, if AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank anyway — and so leave the car off then call 0333 366 0103.