AdBlue in the Diesel Tank in Hay-on-Wye? Keep It Switched Off
Engine off, ignition off: that's where you start if AdBlue has gone into your diesel tank. Water with urea dissolved in it: that is AdBlue. Unlike fuel, it neither burns nor mixes, and no harm happens until your engine sucks it through. If the motor hasn't run yet, AdBlue in a diesel tank is normally drained and thoroughly rinsed where the car stands in Hay-on-Wye. First, call us on 0333 366 0103.
AdBlue in the diesel tank around Hay-on-Wye: the first few minutes
Do these:
- Remove your keys, which prevents someone turning the power on.
- Put the hazards on if you're anywhere near moving traffic.
- The empty bottle or the till receipt tells us the product and the quantity, so do not throw it out.
- Ring right where you are. Say a HR3 5 postcode or the closest street name, and no one has to search for you.
Never:
- Do not start the engine, even for a moment to move the car.
- Switching the key to ignition alone sets the pump going on plenty of diesels. Skip it.
- Adding more diesel doesn't help: AdBlue settles out rather than blending.
- Keep the car where it is rather than driving it anywhere, even a short distance along Town Square.
- Beside the road, don't try emptying it on your own.
The staff working at any Hay-on-Wye forecourt — the Texaco among them — will normally help pushing it aside if you ask. If you're on your own drive, leave the vehicle exactly where it is.
What AdBlue does in a diesel tank
Meant for the exhaust, AdBlue has no place in your motor. From a separate tank it is fed straight to your exhaust, treating what the motor lets out. A fuel pump is not made to take it, and AdBlue was never supposed to go through one.
Inside a diesel tank it behaves really differently from fuel. It doesn't mix in. Heavier than diesel, it drops and pools below it — the very spot the pickup sucks from. A car topped up on a driveway in Bronydd overnight and left unstarted counts as the straightforward one. Nothing has pulled the AdBlue up yet — though once your motor turns, that's what is pulled first, straight from the bottom of that tank.
After it is drawn in, the damage takes two forms. It attacks certain metals found in fuel systems, attacking whatever it touches until it is cleared from the system. And when the water evaporates, the urea turns into crystals that clog filters and lodge in tiny channels. Pipes holding AdBlue mean harm by morning for a car parked in Hay-on-Wye. Just in that tank, it stays stable. The water in it does damage of its own: the high-pressure fuel pump and your injectors depend on diesel to lubricate them, and water offers them nothing.
AdBlue in a diesel: why it's often worse than petrol
A problem of thinned fuel is what you end up with after fuelling a diesel with petrol from the Gulf. No damage comes as long as it stays put, mixed into the diesel — only once your engine runs on it.
The trouble with AdBlue in a diesel is a totally unsuitable substance. It does not burn, and so it cannot simply be run through. It does not stay mixed, and so it cannot be diluted. And crystals and corrosion do not wash out with the next tank of fuel. That is why the flush counts more with AdBlue than with petrol, and why starting your motor "to see" costs more here than almost anywhere else, whether your car is in Archenfield or the middle of Hay-on-Wye.
With AdBlue, the good news is no separate from petrol. Emptying a tank is the easiest job on a fuel system, and without start-up, the AdBlue remains in it — wherever around Powys your vehicle sits.
Hay-on-Wye: how AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank
Nobody means to do it. The AdBlue filler on many vehicles waits right next to your diesel filler, sometimes under the same flap, and the two caps can look alike in poor light. It mostly occurs at home, from a container grabbed on the journey home, not at the forecourt.
Usually, it happens in one of a few familiar ways. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up occurs in a hurry outside Clifford Primary School. Near Castle Street, someone pours a container in on the drive after work. Or someone unfamiliar with that flap refills the car in dim light, parked in the car park outside Kilvert's.
It happens most in the cars motorists know least: a hire car, a new motor, a company car, or the second car of a household with one diesel and one petrol. An identical mistake, same first step — keep it off — anywhere you are in Hay-on-Wye or the rest of Powys.
AdBlue in the diesel tank in Hay-on-Wye, and the engine started?
The AdBlue has left your tank, then. Via the filter, through the lines, and — with any running — on to the high-pressure pump and every injector: that's where it has gone.
Watch for lumpy running, exhaust smoke, falling power, warnings on the dash, or a cut-out — coming back from Brook Street Secret Walled Garden, perhaps, or midway across Hay-on-Wye. Once you safely can, stop then switch everything off — with no turning it on again to test. Each start pulls more of it through.
Hay-on-Wye lies under 50 miles from the M50; if you were on it, leave by the first junction and stop somewhere safe instead of carrying on.
Every mile carries the AdBlue deeper in. That is why crossing Hay-on-Wye to park near Hay Market and a drive of under 25 miles towards Hereford are very different jobs. Approximately how far had it come? Tell us.
There is more to rinse out once your engine has been started, and our technicians do all of it where the vehicle has ended up. When it is spotted early, permanent damage is very uncommon.
Hay-on-Wye: how AdBlue is cleared from a diesel
Anywhere it has come to rest around Hay-on-Wye — a forecourt, a layby, a driveway, a road by The Town Hall — our van comes to your car. Three replies decide the work, and so first our technicians ask which fluid went in, about the amount, and if your engine has turned over.
On the spot, that tank is then drained, and both the contaminated diesel and the urea leave at once. What remains from AdBlue will not wash away by itself, and so the whole system gets a careful flush, which counts much more with urea than for petrol. Testing your vehicle comes last, after clean diesel goes in and your filter gets flushed or, where needed, replaced. Engine not run? In that case count on roughly half an hour once we are there for most jobs. The pumps are explosion-proof, safe on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark.
Fresh diesel goes in to bleed your system, and that is the last step. Whether it is a parking space at the nearest station or a driveway in Hay-on-Wye, that is where our technicians start it and you head off. It's checked on fresh diesel to make sure it runs properly before we go. We do it all wherever the vehicle has stopped, and it never has to be taken to a workshop. Insurers ask for a VAT invoice and an engineer report, and you get both at the end.
About Hay-on-Wye
Hay-on-Wye is a small town situated on the River Wye in Powys, Wales, with a population of around 2065 people. Hay-on-Wye sits at an elevation of 105 metres, close to the English border and near the towns of Cusop, Clyro, and Llanigon. Hay-on-Wye has a mix of housing types, but terraced houses are particularly prevalent in the town. Hay-on-Wye is located 17.4 miles from Hereford and 134 miles from London.
AdBlue drains in Hay-on-Wye and across Powys
The teams that answer AdBlue jobs around Hay-on-Wye also cover the places round it, Cusop, Clyro and Llanigon among them, and most of Powys beyond, across the HR postcode area. If you are near a boundary, or somewhere hard to explain, ring and ask rather than guessing.
Anywhere your car sits — your driveway at home, a side street, a car park, a filling station — our technicians empty it there, with no need to take it to us; which suits Hay-on-Wye, a riverside town, well.
What does AdBlue in a diesel tank cost to sort out in Hay-on-Wye?
Each job is different, so not one single quote would be honest. What moves the price is, first of all, whether your engine has been running and for how long; then how much AdBlue was put in; and finally where the vehicle is and whether a van can get to it safely, which is easier on an open driveway than in a tight spot behind The Chair.
Which fluid was put in, what quantity, plus whether the engine ran: every Hay-on-Wye enquiry opens with exactly those, ahead of any quote, not after. With them, a range shrinks to a single fixed figure.
Quoted on the call before the engineer heads out, it is paid for that day — card or phone, no deposit. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it's worth checking yours while we are on the way.
Hay-on-Wye: still next to the car?
Then the most useful thing you can do is nothing to your car. Keys out, engine off, ignition off. Tell us it was AdBlue, roughly what quantity, and whether it ran, on 0333 366 0103. From there Petrol in Diesel handles it, in Hay-on-Wye or anywhere within Powys.