AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Harpur Hill: How It Occurs and How to Stop It
AdBlue already in your diesel tank? Then put this page aside for now, leave your ignition and engine off, and call 0333 366 0103. Caught before your engine runs, it is usually a drain and a thorough flush, done where the car is around Harpur Hill. Nothing happened yet? Further down, the rest of the page covers the why it occurs and the how to prevent it for good.
AdBlue in a diesel motor, and its separate tank
Diesel feeds your engine — yet plenty of current diesels driven around Harpur Hill and Cowdale carry another liquid as well. AdBlue goes to the exhaust, where it is sprayed into the gas to fresh it, and it lives in a tank of its own.
Each tank has one filler of its own. Under one flap, side by side: that is the layout on many vehicles. On others, AdBlue's filler is beneath the bonnet or in the boot instead. Diesel gets filled at each filling station visit, week in, week out. Much less commonly, the AdBlue side gets topped up — normally from a bottle, by someone working out where it goes. The mistake lives in that gap.
Harpur Hill: how AdBlue in the diesel tank occurs
Three things tend to come together, and carelessness is seldom one of them.
On a driveway off Burlow Road before work, or in the car park outside Parks Inn on the way home: that is where the hurried top-up takes place. What is the reason for the rush? As AdBlue runs low the car warns you, and if it is empty, limp mode kicks in.
Then, the hand goes for the cap it knew on the old motor — since a rental car, a new motor or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't.
No part stops the pour after it has started, since a bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as readily as an AdBlue one. The bottle fits. It's seconds, whether in Staden or right in the centre of Harpur Hill.
The AdBlue filler and your diesel filler: telling them apart
Look at these before pouring, at a forecourt in Harpur Hill or a drive out in Buxton. Seconds, no more.
- Check the cap instead of going by where it sits: AdBlue caps are commonly blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel caps normally aren't.
- On plenty of motors, size gives it away: AdBlue gets the smaller filler neck.
- Check inside the fuel flap: many motors have a label there saying which fuel goes where.
- The handbook. If the filler is not by your diesel cap, it's in your boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- Whoever had it before knows. Check as you collect a rental or fleet car — from Buxton's car park, say — not when the warning comes on.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach the diesel tank
Wherever across Derbyshire the light comes on, this is a routine for the day.
- Park and switch off. Not on a slope, not with your engine running, and not in a rush on the side of Harpur Hill Road.
- Silly as it sounds, saying "AdBlue" aloud as you unscrew the cap does the trick — once you've located the filler and read the cap.
- Both under one flap? Then make sure the lid on the diesel filler is still shut ahead of lifting the bottle.
- Stop once the tank is topped up or the bottle runs dry; before that, pour slowly using the own spout.
- Shut the cap, then look once more — confirm the diesel filler stayed shut the whole time. Only then, start the vehicle.
Find at stage two or three that it has already gone into the diesel side? Then stop just there. Skip stage five altogether.
Already put AdBlue in your diesel tank in Harpur Hill?
Do not start your engine: that is where the short order of things starts. Leave your ignition off too, since on plenty of diesels it by itself runs your pump. Don't top up with diesel to thin it: AdBlue doesn't mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of the tank, where the fuel is sucked from.
If you are at a forecourt, whether it is the Esso or the Morrisons, ask the staff to help push the vehicle away from the petrol pump. Your own drive around Harpur Hill is the place it should stay.
If the motor has already run, stop as soon as it is safe and switch off. Harpur Hill lies under 25 miles from the M60; there, take the next exit. Distance counts — a quick hop across Harpur Hill is a smaller job than heading under 25 miles towards Stoke-on-Trent — so tell us about how far it went.
Our arrival in Harpur Hill, and what occurs next
Our technicians come to your car wherever it has stopped, whether that is outside Harpur Hill Primary School, near St James or on your own driveway. Which liquid went in, the amount, and whether it ran: we ask since those answers set both work and price. No one heads out before you've had the price over the phone.
Draining your tank comes next, followed by a full flush of the fuel system. 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 counts more here than with petrol. Once your filter has been flushed — or renewed, where needed — clean diesel goes in, and then your car is tested. Then our technicians start the car and check it runs properly before we go.
Most jobs are finished in roughly half an hour once we arrive, as long as your motor has not run — and the pumps we use are fine on a live forecourt and quiet after dark outside a house. You pay on the day, with nothing upfront, and get a VAT invoice and an engineer report for your insurer. It is worth looking at your insurance while we travel to you: misfuelling cover comes with many policies.
About Harpur Hill and where it is
Harpur Hill is a village in Derbyshire, situated in the East Midlands region of England, with an elevation of 361 metres. Harpur Hill lies near the towns of Buxton and Leek, and is close to the villages of Staden and Canholes. Harpur Hill has a population of around 1091 people, predominantly living in semi-detached houses. Harpur Hill is located approximately 18.5 miles from Stoke-on-Trent and 141.1 miles from London.
AdBlue drains round Harpur Hill, and Derbyshire beyond
Harpur Hill is a rural village, and our vans that cover it also work the places around it, Canholes and Higher Buxton among them, across the SK postcode area. A postcode starting SK17 9 gets the van to you fastest.
The vehicle doesn't need to shift. Anywhere it sits — beside Solomon's Temple, on a lay-by en route to Sherbrook Wood, on a drive — that's where it is cleared. Ring and ask rather than assuming if you're close to a border, or somewhere hard to explain, like the back of Archie’s Farm.
In short, for Harpur Hill drivers
Always, the cap; after that, the tip. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank all the same, leave the car off then call 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel clears it where it sits, anywhere in Derbyshire.