Head Crag: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Prevent It?
Leave your motor and ignition off and phone 0333 366 0103 first — the rest can wait if AdBlue is already in the diesel tank. Normally, when the motor has not run, it is drained and fully purged where the vehicle sits around Head Crag. If you're reading before it has happened, the remainder of this page is about why it occurs and how to make sure it does not.
AdBlue in a diesel motor, and its separate tank
Diesel feeds the motor — but many modern diesels driven round Head Crag and Wall End carry a second fluid as well. AdBlue's own tank keeps it, and from there it goes to your exhaust, and there a spray cleans the gas.
Every tank has a filler of its own. Other vehicles keep the AdBlue filler in the boot or under the bonnet; plenty of others place the two side by side under one flap. At the pump, your diesel side is topped up all the time. Rarely filled, AdBlue usually comes out of a bottle, tipped by someone who must stop and think what filler to use. It is in the gap that the mistake lives.
How AdBlue in your diesel tank occurs in Head Crag
Rarely is it carelessness: usually three things line up.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low the car tells you, and if it runs out completely, the vehicle goes into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a drive off Marsh Side before work, or in the car park at The Ship Inn on the way home.
Then your car is strange. A hire car, a new motor or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't, and the hand reaches for the cap it would have used on the old one.
Third, the bottle fits: diesel filler or AdBlue one, it slides in as easily, and once the tip begins, nothing halts it. It's seconds, be it out in Sand Side or bang in the centre of Head Crag.
The AdBlue filler and your diesel filler: telling them apart
Check these first, at a forecourt around Head Crag or a drive over in Beck Side. A few seconds, that's all.
- Where it sits can mislead; the cap does not. AdBlue caps are often blue or carry the word "AdBlue" — diesel caps usually do not.
- The size. On plenty of vehicles the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- Look inside the fuel flap: plenty of cars carry a label there showing which fuel goes where.
- Can't see it next to the diesel inlet? Then look beneath the bonnet or in the boot — the owner's manual says where.
- 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 Kirkby-In-Furness.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching your diesel tank
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever in Cumbria that is.
- Stop on level, motor off, with time to spare — never hurried on the side of Askewgate Brow.
- Daft as it sounds, speaking "AdBlue" out loud while you unscrew the cap works — once you have located the filler and read the cap.
- If both sit under one flap, check the diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — then leave the vehicle on.
- Using the bottle's own spout, tip slowly — and stop when it is full or the bottle is empty.
- Close the cap, then check again — confirm the diesel cap remained shut the whole time. After that, start your car.
Find at the second or third stage that the bottle went into the wrong tank? That is where you stop. Step five is out.
AdBlue in the diesel tank already, in Head Crag?
Then the order of things is short. Do not start the engine. On many diesels your ignition alone runs the fuel pump, so do not switch the car on. AdBlue doesn't mix with diesel — it sinks to the bottom of that tank, where the fuel is pulled from — so don't top up with diesel to dilute it.
If you're on a forecourt, whether it's the Grizebeck Service Station or the CGP Pitstop, ask the attendants to help push your car away from the pump. If you're on your own driveway around Head Crag, leave the vehicle where it stands.
When the engine has run already, pull over somewhere safe then turn it off. Leave the M6 — under 25 miles out of Head Crag — at the next exit. Roughly how far did it go? Crossing Head Crag is less work than a trip of under 25 miles towards Lancaster, so tell us.
What happens when our technicians arrive in Head Crag
Wherever the vehicle has stopped, whether by Burlington CofE School, beside Kirkby-in-Furness Community Centre or on your own drive, our van comes to it. Both the work and our price depend on three replies — what fluid, what quantity, and whether it's run — so our technicians ask. During the call itself, you hear our quote — before dispatch.
The system is then cleaned thoroughly, after that tank is drained. Not like petrol, AdBlue leaves crystals and eats at certain fuel-system metals, and none of it clears away unaided. That is why it matters more. The filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; fresh diesel goes in; and the vehicle is tested. The motor is started next and checked to confirm it runs correctly, all before our technicians go.
Most jobs are done in about half an hour once our engineers get there, as long as your motor hasn't run — and the pumps our technicians use are safe on a live forecourt and quiet after dark beside a house. Paying happens on the day, not upfront, and you are given the documents your insurer wants: an engineer's report and a VAT invoice. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it is worth checking yours whilst we're on the way.
About Head Crag itself
Head Crag is a small suburban area situated on the coast of Cumbria, with an elevation of around 8 metres above sea level. Head Crag lies near the towns of Kirkby-in-Furness and Lancaster, and is close to other nearby places such as Sand Side and Four Lane Ends. Head Crag is characterised by its predominantly detached housing stock, reflecting its residential nature. Head Crag is located approximately 227.5 miles from London, in the north west of England.
Head Crag and Cumbria: AdBlue drains across the area
As a residential suburb, Head Crag has the same vans as surrounding areas — Kirkby-in-Furness, Four Lane Ends — all the way across LA postcodes and the surrounding area beyond. Quickest of all: give a LA17 7 postcode for our van.
The vehicle doesn't need to move. Draining happens right there, be it a drive, a street near Sandside Gospel Hall, or a lay-by towards Kirkby Community Playing Field. If you are near a boundary, or somewhere hard to describe like the back of Church of Christ, ring and ask rather than guessing.
In short, for Head Crag people
First, the cap; then, the pour. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank regardless, leave the vehicle off and ring 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it waits, anywhere across Cumbria.