How It Occurs and How to Prevent It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Hastings
Keep your engine and ignition off and call 0333 366 0103 now — the rest can wait if AdBlue is already in the diesel tank. Caught before the engine runs, it's normally a drain and a thorough flush, done where the vehicle is around Hastings. The rest of this page covers why it takes place and how to ensure it doesn't — useful if you're reading ahead of time.
AdBlue in a diesel car, and its separate tank
Diesel goes to the motor — but many current diesels seen around Hastings and Broomsgrove hold another liquid too. Stored in a tank of its own, AdBlue is sprayed into your exhaust stream and cleans it.
Each tank has its own filler. Many of vehicles have a single flap for both, whereas some move the AdBlue filler to the boot or under the bonnet. At the petrol pump, the diesel side gets filled constantly. Seldom filled, AdBlue usually comes out of a bottle, poured by a driver who must stop and think what filler to use. The mistake lives in that gap.
AdBlue in the diesel tank around Hastings: how it happens
Three things tend to come together, and carelessness is seldom one of them.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low the car tells you, and if it runs out completely, your vehicle drops into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a driveway off Queens Road before work, or in the car park at The Clown on the way home.
Then the car is strange. A hire car, a new car or a company car puts the fillers where your last one did not, and the hand hits for the cap it would have used on the old one.
A spouted bottle meets no resistance at a diesel filler any more than at an AdBlue one. And so the tip, once started, carries on. The same few seconds decide it, in the middle of Hastings or out in The America Ground.
The AdBlue filler and your diesel filler: telling them apart
Check these before pouring, on a forecourt around Hastings or a drive over in Blacklands. A few seconds, that's all.
- Read the cap instead of going by where it sits: AdBlue ones are regularly blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel ones usually are not.
- Many vehicles give AdBlue the smaller neck of the two.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Many motors say there which fuel goes where.
- Can't see it beside your diesel inlet? In that case look below the bonnet or in your boot — the handbook says which.
- Ask the person who drove it last — before you leave, not when the light comes on — if you pick up a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park at the nearest station.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach your diesel tank
On the day the warning comes on — anywhere it is around East Sussex — a simple routine to use.
- Not in a rush on the side of Russell Street, not on a slope, not with the engine running: park then switch off first.
- Locate the AdBlue filler, check the cap, and say the word "AdBlue" out loud as unscrewing it. It seems daft. It works.
- The diesel cap stays on. When both share a flap, confirm it's shut before the bottle comes up.
- Stop when your tank is topped up or the bottle runs dry; before that, pour slowly through its built-in spout.
- Close the cap and check once more. Make sure the diesel cap was never opened. Only then start the car.
If at stage two or three you find you have already poured into your diesel side, stop there. Do not go on to step five.
AdBlue in the diesel tank already, around Hastings?
Then the order of things is short. Do not start the engine. Do not switch your ignition on; on plenty of diesels that alone runs the fuel pump. Filling up with diesel will not weaken it: instead, AdBlue drops to the base of the tank, just where fuel is drawn from.
The attendants at Morrisons, Esso or another forecourt will normally lend a hand pushing your car clear when you ask. At home around Hastings? So the vehicle stays put.
Where your motor has run by now, stop safely then switch it off. The next junction is the place to leave if you are on the M20, under 25 miles from Hastings. Tell us about how far it went: a run towards Brighton and Hove, under 50 miles away, is a bigger job than a short hop across Hastings.
Hastings: what happens when our technicians arrive
Outside Ark Castledown Primary Academy, near Odeon or on your own driveway: wherever the car has stopped, our engineers come to it. Both the work and our price rest on three replies — what liquid, which amount, and if it's run — so we ask. No one sets off until you've had the quote by phone.
Then that tank is drained and the system purged thoroughly. Much more than with petrol, it matters with AdBlue: the crystals form, certain metals corrode, and nothing clears out on its own, however long it is left. Your filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and your car is tested. Then we fire it up and confirm it runs correctly before leaving.
Unrun cars mostly mean a half-hour visit after arrival. The equipment is fine on a busy filling station, and quiet enough for a residential street after dark. The insurer usually wants an engineer's report and the VAT invoice, and both are yours once the job is done. Payment comes on the day, with no deposit. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it is worth checking yours whilst we are on the way.
About Hastings, briefly
Hastings is a coastal town in East Sussex, situated on the southeastern coast of England, with a low elevation of around 7 metres above sea level. Hastings has a mix of housing types, but is predominantly composed of flats, and is located near to notable areas such as The America Ground, West Hill, and Old Town. Hastings is also close to the city of Brighton and Hove, which is approximately 31.7 miles away, and is about 54.5 miles from London. Hastings has a population of around 23,199 people.
AdBlue drains across East Sussex, Hastings included
Hastings is a coastal town, and our vans that cover it also work the towns near it, West Hill and Old Town among them, across the TN postcode area. Quickest of all: quote a TN34 1 postcode to our van.
Moving the car isn't necessary. Anywhere it stands — near Hastings Town Hall, in a layby en route to Wellington Square, at home — that is where it gets drained. Guessing doesn't help behind Wellington Square Baptist Church, on a boundary, or somewhere hard to pin down; ring and ask.
In short, for Hastings drivers
First, the cap; after that, the pour. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank anyway, leave the vehicle off and phone 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel empties it where it sits, anywhere in East Sussex.