Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Heath Hayes
AdBlue in your diesel tank? Then leave the motor off — and your ignition too. Water with urea mixed in it: that's AdBlue. Being water-based, it will not burn and won't blend with diesel; trouble only comes when the pump starts pulling it. If the engine hasn't run yet, AdBlue in a diesel tank is generally emptied and carefully flushed where the vehicle stands in Heath Hayes. Phone 0333 366 0103 before you do anything else.
Your next steps right now, Heath Hayes: AdBlue in your diesel tank
Do:
- Take your keys out, so no one switches your ignition on.
- Hazards on, if moving traffic is at all close.
- Which fluid, and roughly what volume? Save the bottle or the receipt, and we will see.
- Tell us a postcode starting WS12 2, or whatever street is nearest, and the van finds you directly — so ring wherever you are.
Do not:
- Not even for a second, and not to shift your vehicle: the motor remains off.
- Switching the key to ignition alone starts the pump running on plenty of diesels. Skip it.
- No extra fuel on top. The AdBlue won't mix, and so it is wasted.
- Never drive the vehicle anywhere, not even a short way along Gorsemoor Road.
- No draining it yourself, at all, at the verge.
On a forecourt around Heath Hayes, whether it's the the nearest petrol station or another one, ask the staff to help you push the car away from the petrol pump. On that drive, the car remains just as it was left.
What does AdBlue do in a diesel tank?
Meant for your exhaust, AdBlue has no business in your engine. From a dedicated tank it is fed straight to the exhaust, cleaning what your motor lets out. Not one side suits the other: urea does not belong in an injection pump, and an injection pump can't take urea.
It doesn't blend. After it is poured into a tank of diesel, AdBlue behaves nothing like fuel. The intake sucks fuel from the lowest part of the tank, and that's exactly where AdBlue settles: being heavier than diesel, it sinks. A motor topped up on a drive in Church Hill yesterday evening and left unstarted is the straightforward one. Nothing has sucked the AdBlue up so far — but once your motor runs, that's what is pulled first, straight from the bottom of that tank.
It does two kinds of damage from there. What is left once the water evaporates is urea, which forms crystals: they lodge in narrow passages and block filters. Worse, it attacks certain metals in a fuel system, and carries on till it's flushed out. A motor left sitting around Heath Hayes with AdBlue already in its lines is worse by the morning; one with AdBlue only in its tank is not. Water lubricates nothing. The high-pressure pump and every injector need diesel flowing through them, so the water part harms them by itself.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel regularly the bigger issue?
A problem of thinned fuel is what you end up with after fuelling a diesel with petrol from the Tesco. Mixed into the diesel and left still, it is no threat at that stage; using your motor does the harm.
AdBlue in a diesel is another matter: not thin fuel, yet no fuel at all. It does not burn, and so it cannot simply be run through. Whether your car sits in Hawks Green or the centre of Heath Hayes, turning it over "to see" does more harm in this case than almost any other mistake, and the flush counts more. The reasons: it won't stay blended, and so diluting it fails; and deposits and corrosion outlast the next fill.
The same good news applies as with petrol. If your motor has not run, the AdBlue is still inside that tank, and your tank is the quickest part of a fuel system to clear, wherever around Staffordshire the vehicle is standing.
How AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank in Heath Hayes
It's not on purpose. Many vehicles have the AdBlue inlet alongside the diesel one, occasionally under one flap, and muddling them up is easy after dark. Usually it is not the filling station: someone buys a container heading home and tips it in outside the house.
It tends to take place in a few familiar ways. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up occurs in a hurry outside Five Ways Primary School. Close to Hednesford Road, someone pours a bottle in at home in the evening. Or someone unfamiliar with that flap tops up the car after dark, parked in the car park by Newhall Farm.
It occurs most in the vehicles motorists know least: a hire car, a new motor, a company car, or the second vehicle of a household with one diesel and one petrol. Keep it switched off: that's the first step to an identical mistake, wherever around Heath Hayes or the rest of Staffordshire you happen to be.
Already started the engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank around Heath Hayes?
In that case, the AdBlue is no longer inside your tank. The fuel filter and lines have had it pulled through, and any running takes it on to the high-pressure pump and every injector.
Maybe coming back from Old Brickworks Nature Reserve, or midway across Heath Hayes, the engine may run lumpy, smoke, drop power, light up your dash or cut out. When safe, pull over then switch everything off — without restarting to test. Each start pulls more of that through.
Leave the M6 Toll, under 3 miles from Heath Hayes, at the next junction and park safely, not carrying on.
How far it went counts. A few hundred yards across Heath Hayes to the car park by St. John's Church is a very different job from a run towards Lichfield, under 10 miles away, with the AdBlue reaching further into the fuel system with every mile. Tell us roughly how far it had come.
We do all of the rinsing where your car has ended up, and once your engine has been started there is more of it. Caught soon, it very seldom leaves permanent damage.
Clearing AdBlue in a diesel in Heath Hayes: what it takes
A road by Heath Hayes Library, a driveway, a lay-by or a forecourt: wherever your vehicle has come to rest in Heath Hayes, our technicians come to it. What went in, about how much, and whether the motor has turned over: our engineers ask first, because those decide the job.
Then that tank is emptied where your car stands, so the contaminated fuel and the AdBlue come out together. With AdBlue, more so than with petrol, the flush matters: the whole system is flushed right through because residue won't flush out by itself. The fuel filter is flushed, or replaced where it needs to be; fresh diesel goes in; and the car is tested. Not run? Then expect about half an hour once we are there for most jobs. The pumps are explosion-proof, safe on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark.
Bleeding the fuel system with new diesel comes last. You drive off as soon as our technicians have fired it up, and it makes no difference whether your car is on a drive around Heath Hayes or in a space by Hednesford. Our engineers check it runs smoothly on new diesel before leaving. The whole job is done where the car is, so it never needs to be taken to a garage. At the end, there is the paperwork for the insurer: a VAT invoice and a written report from the engineer.
About Heath Hayes
Heath Hayes is a suburban area in Staffordshire, situated near the River Trent and close to the cities of Lichfield and Cannock. Heath Hayes has a mix of housing types, but semi-detached homes are predominant, and the area is characterized by its relatively high elevation of 181 metres. Heath Hayes is part of the larger West Midlands region, but retains a distinct identity as a residential community with nearby neighbourhoods including Wimblebury and Littleworth.
AdBlue drains in Heath Hayes and across Staffordshire
The vans that answer AdBlue call-outs around Heath Hayes also cover the locations round it, Wimblebury, Littleworth and Hill Top among them, and most of Staffordshire beyond, across the WS postcode area. If you're near a boundary, or somewhere hard to explain, ring and ask rather than guessing.
Heath Hayes is a residential suburb, and a mobile drain suits it: whether the vehicle is on a home drive, a residential street, a car park or a forecourt, our engineers drain it where it is, and so it never needs to be shifted to us.
Heath Hayes: what AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to fix
Not one single price would be fair, because every job is different. What shifts the cost is, firstly, whether your engine has run and for how long; then how much AdBlue was put in; and then where the car is and whether our van can reach it safely, which is easier on an open drive than in a tight gap behind Hednesford Pentecostal Church.
With that reason, each enquiry from Heath Hayes opens with the identical trio — what went in, how much, if it ran — before a figure. Those replies narrow a range down to a single figure.
The price is given on the call, before a van leaves; payment happens on the day, by card or over the phone, and nothing upfront. Check your policy while we're on the way: plenty carry misfuelling cover.
Heath Hayes: still alongside the vehicle?
Then the most handy thing you can do is nothing to your car. Ignition off, motor off, keys out. Ring 0333 366 0103 then tell us it's AdBlue, roughly how much, and whether it's run. Petrol in Diesel takes it from there, in Heath Hayes or anywhere in Staffordshire.