Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Hawkcombe
With AdBlue in your diesel tank, your ignition remains off and so does the engine. AdBlue is urea dissolved in water. Being water-based, it won't ignite and never combines with diesel; trouble just comes once the pump starts drawing it. Caught before your motor has run, AdBlue in a diesel tank is generally a drain and a thorough flush, done where your car is around Hawkcombe. First, call us on 0333 366 0103.
Hawkcombe, AdBlue in the diesel tank: what to do straight away
Do:
- Keys out — that way nobody can power anything on.
- Close to moving traffic? Then put the hazards on.
- So you can give us which fluid it was and about what quantity, keep your receipt or the empty bottle.
- Our van finds you fastest with a postcode starting TA24 8, or just the name of a street close by, so call from the car.
Do not do these:
- Shifting the car even a few yards is no reason to fire up the motor.
- Plenty of diesels power their fuel pump the moment the ignition goes on, and so keep it off.
- Do not top up with diesel to dilute it. AdBlue does not mix in diesel; it separates out.
- Never drive the vehicle anywhere, not even a short distance down Mill Lane.
- No emptying it yourself, either, on the verge.
The staff on duty at any Hawkcombe filling station — the the nearest petrol station included — will usually lend a hand rolling it clear if you ask. At your own driveway, don't move it at all.
AdBlue in a diesel tank: what it does
Not your motor but your exhaust is where AdBlue is meant to go. Its own reservoir keeps it, and from there it's fed into your exhaust, where it cleans the fumes. Not one side suits the other: urea does not belong in a pump, and a pump can't deal with urea.
Tipped in with the diesel, it keeps separate instead of mixing — quite unlike fuel. The pickup takes fuel from the lowest part of your tank, and that's precisely where AdBlue ends up: as it is denser than diesel, it sinks. The first thing the system pulls through, once it runs, is the AdBlue. So a car that had AdBlue poured in on a drive in West Porlock last night, and has not been started since, is still the easy case: the AdBlue is lying at the bottom of the tank, and nothing has pulled it in.
Once it's pulled in, the damage comes in two forms. It eats at certain metals used in fuel components, attacking whatever it touches until it is removed completely. And when the water evaporates, the urea forms crystals that clog filters and lodge in narrow channels. By daybreak, a vehicle parked around Hawkcombe with AdBlue through its pipework gets worse; where it's only inside your tank, it doesn't. The water in it does damage of its own: your high-pressure pump and the fuel injectors depend on diesel to lubricate them, and water offers them nothing.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel regularly the bigger problem?
Top up a diesel with petrol by mistake at the another forecourt nearby, and the problem is diluted fuel. It mixes with the diesel, and whilst it is inside your tank it does no damage; the damage comes from running the motor on it.
AdBlue in a diesel is a fault of the wrong substance altogether. It cannot just be run through, because it does not burn. Nor can it be watered down, since it separates again — and the following fill won't rinse away deposits or corrosion. So the flush matters for more with AdBlue, and turning your key "to see", in the heart of Hawkcombe or out in Horner, costs more than nearly any other slip.
As with petrol, there's good news. Not run? Then the AdBlue sits only in that tank, the simplest section of the entire system to empty, wherever the vehicle has stopped across Somerset.
How does AdBlue end up in a diesel tank around Hawkcombe?
In dim light, two caps side by side — the AdBlue cap and the diesel cap, occasionally behind one flap — may appear the same. Nobody means it; many layouts invite it. Mostly it takes place with a bottle bought on the way home and poured in on the drive, not at the pump.
It tends to occur in a couple of familiar ways. The top-up is hurried outside St Dubricius Church of England VA School, after the dash flashed with a warning as the children were dropped off. Someone tips the bottle in outside their house, right off High Street, as the day ends. One more version: dim light, a pub car park outside The Castle, and a driver using that flap for the first time.
It crops up most in a rental, a new motor, a company vehicle, or the other car in a family with one of each fuel types — the cars drivers know least. Same mistake, an identical first step — keep it switched off — wherever you happen to be in Hawkcombe or the rest of Somerset.
Hawkcombe: started the engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank?
The AdBlue has left your tank, then. The fuel filter and lines have had it pulled through, and any running time carries it on to the injection pump and each injector.
You may see your motor running roughly, smoking, losing power, showing warning lights or cutting out, maybe on the way back from Porlock Recreation Ground or halfway across Hawkcombe. Stop when safe. Switch off. Leave the car off rather than restarting it to check. More of it is pulled through with each start.
Hawkcombe sits under 25 miles from the M4; if you were on it, exit by the next junction and stop safely instead of driving on.
How far it went matters. A few hundred yards across Hawkcombe to the car park by Porlock Art Den is a very different job from a run towards Cardiff, under 50 miles away, with the AdBlue reaching further into your system with every mile. Let us know about how far it had come.
Wherever the car came to a stop is where all of it gets done, even with more to rinse out after the motor has been running. Very rarely does it leave lasting damage when it's caught soon.
What does an AdBlue drain on a diesel involve around Hawkcombe?
The vehicle stays put, whether that is a street beside St Dubricius Church, a drive, a layby or a forecourt in Hawkcombe, and the van travels to it. The job depends on three answers, and our engineers ask for first — what was put in, the quantity, and whether your motor has turned over.
Next, emptying that tank on the spot takes out the contaminated diesel along with the AdBlue in one go. Your system is flushed thoroughly, which matters more with AdBlue than with petrol, since what it leaves behind does not rinse out on its own. Your filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and your car is tested. If your engine has not run, the majority of jobs take about half an hour once our technicians arrive. The pumps are explosion-proof, safe on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark.
New diesel goes in to bleed the fuel system, and that's the final step. Starting it comes next, and then you set off from where your car is parked, outside the nearest station or on a driveway in Hawkcombe. Our engineers check it runs properly on new diesel before leaving. Our engineers do it all wherever the vehicle has ended up, and it never needs to go to a garage. At the end, there is the paperwork for the insurer: a VAT invoice plus a report from the engineer.
About Hawkcombe, briefly
Hawkcombe is a small locality on the coast of Somerset, situated near the villages of Porlock and West Luccombe. Hawkcombe has a population of around 638 people and is characterised by terraced housing. Hawkcombe sits at an elevation of 76 metres, overlooking the surrounding countryside. Hawkcombe is located near the Exmoor National Park, with the nearest city being Cardiff, approximately 26 miles away.
AdBlue drains around Hawkcombe and across Somerset
Our vans that answer AdBlue calls in Hawkcombe also cover the locations round it, Doverhay, Porlock and West Luccombe among them, and most of Somerset beyond, across the TA postcode area. Phone and ask instead of guessing if you are close to a border, or anywhere tricky to explain.
A van that comes to you fits Hawkcombe, a coastal area: you have no need to take your vehicle to us, since our engineers empty it on the spot, in a drive, a side street, a car park or a forecourt.
Hawkcombe: what AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to fix
Because the jobs differ, a single figure would not be fair. Three things move the cost: whether the motor has been running and for how long, how much AdBlue was put in, and where the vehicle is. That last one rests on whether a van can reach it safely, and an open drive is simpler than a tight gap behind Churchgate Gallery & Framing.
With that in mind, each call from Hawkcombe opens with the identical trio — what went in, what quantity, if the engine ran — ahead of a quote. Those answers narrow a range down to one figure.
Priced by phone before the engineer heads out, the job is settled on the day — card or phone, nothing in advance. As our engineer is on the way, dig out your policy: many cover misfuelling.
Still alongside your car around Hawkcombe?
Then the most useful thing you can do is nothing to your car. Keys out; engine and ignition off. Petrol in Diesel handles the rest, in Hawkcombe or anywhere in Somerset, once you ring 0333 366 0103 saying it was AdBlue, roughly how big an amount, and if it ran.