AdBlue in the Diesel Tank in Higher Town? Keep It Switched Off
AdBlue in the diesel tank? Then leave the motor off — and the ignition too. Water with urea mixed in it: that's AdBlue. Being water-based, it won't ignite and won't blend with diesel; damage only starts once your pump begins pulling it. A drain and a thorough flush, done where your car is around Higher Town, is normally all AdBlue in a diesel tank needs — if it is caught before the engine has been run. Nothing comes before ringing 0333 366 0103.
What to do right now, Higher Town: AdBlue in the diesel tank
Do:
- Keys out — that way nobody can power anything on.
- If you're at all near moving traffic, put the hazard lights on.
- So you can tell us which fluid it was and roughly how much, keep your receipt or the empty bottle.
- Tell us a postcode starting TA24 5, or whichever street is nearest, and the van reaches you directly — so call from wherever you stand.
Not to do:
- No starting the motor — not for a second, not to shift the vehicle.
- Turning your key to ignition alone sets your pump going on many diesels. Avoid it.
- AdBlue doesn't mix in diesel — it separates out — so adding extra diesel will not thin it.
- Do not drive the vehicle anywhere, not even a short way along St Michael's Road.
- Beside the road, do not attempt emptying it on your own.
On a forecourt in Higher Town, whether it's the Texaco or another one, ask the attendants to help you roll the vehicle clear of the petrol pump. On your own drive, do not move it at all.
What AdBlue does in a diesel tank
Not your engine but your exhaust is where AdBlue belongs. It goes into its own tank and is sprayed into your exhaust gas to fresh it. Nothing in it is meant to pass through a fuel pump, and nothing in a fuel pump is built to handle it.
Fuel blends; AdBlue, once poured in, won't. The behaviour is nothing like fuel's. The intake takes fuel from the lowest part of your tank, and that is precisely where AdBlue ends up: as it is heavier than diesel, it sinks. The first thing your fuel system pulls through, after it runs, is the AdBlue. So a car that had AdBlue poured in on a drive in Alcombe last night, and has not been started since, is still the easy case: the AdBlue is lying at the bottom of that tank, and nothing has drawn it in.
After it is sucked in, the damage takes two forms. It eats at certain metals used in fuel components, working on any part it reaches till it's removed completely. And once the water goes, the urea turns into crystals that block filters and settle in narrow passages. If the AdBlue is in the lines, leaving it till morning in Higher Town leaves it worse. In that tank only, waiting costs nothing. Diesel protects the injection pump and each injector as it passes; water gives none of that, which is a second kind of damage.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel often the bigger problem?
A fault of thinned fuel is what you get from filling a diesel with petrol at the Morrisons. Mixed through your diesel and sitting unused, it is harmless at that stage; running the engine does the harm.
AdBlue in a diesel is another matter: not thin fuel, but no fuel at all. Since it does not burn, running it through is not an option. Crystals and corrosion stay through the following fill, and AdBlue separates back out of your diesel, and so thinning it can't work. That is why the flush counts more, and turning the key "to see" does more harm with AdBlue than almost any other mistake — in Bratton or the heart of Higher Town alike.
As with petrol, there is good news. Not started? Then the AdBlue sits just inside your tank, the easiest bit of the whole system to empty, anywhere your car has stopped across Somerset.
AdBlue in a diesel tank around Higher Town: how it ends up there
In dim light, two caps together — the AdBlue cap and the diesel cap, now and then under a single flap — may appear the same. Nobody intends it; many layouts allow it. It mostly happens outside the house, from a container bought en route home, not at the filling station.
A few familiar ways account for the majority of them. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up happens in a hurry outside St Michael's Church of England First School. A driver tips the container in outside their house, just off Ballfield Road, as the day ends. One more version: dim light, a pub car park by The Quay Inn, and someone using that flap for the first time.
It takes place most in the vehicles drivers know least: a hire car, a new motor, a company car, or the second vehicle of a household with one diesel and one petrol. Leave it switched off: that is the first step to the same mistake, wherever in Higher Town or the rest of Somerset you happen to be.
Higher Town: started the motor with AdBlue in the diesel tank?
The AdBlue has left the tank, then. The filter and lines have had it pulled through, and any running takes it on to the high-pressure pump and every injector.
Lumpy running, smoke, lost power, dashboard warnings or stalling: each might appear, perhaps part way across Higher Town or coming back from Blenheim Gardens. Stop as soon as it is safe, switch off, and don't restart it to check. Each start pulls more of that through.
Exit the M5, under 25 miles from Higher Town, by the next junction and stop somewhere safe, rather than carrying on.
How far it went counts. A couple of hundred yards across Higher Town to the car park by St Michael's Church is a very different job from a run towards Cardiff, under 25 miles away, with the AdBlue reaching further into the fuel system with each mile. About how far it had come is worth telling us.
There is more to clean out once your engine has been started, and our technicians do all of it where the car has stopped. If it is spotted soon, permanent damage is very rare.
Higher Town: how AdBlue is drained from a diesel
The car remains where it is, whether that is a road beside War Memorial, a drive, a layby or a forecourt in Higher Town, and the van travels to it. The job rests on three answers, which our engineers get before all else — which fluid got in, the quantity, and if the motor has turned over.
Then the tank is drained where the car stands, and so the tainted fuel and the AdBlue come out together. The fuel system is cleaned thoroughly, which counts more with AdBlue than with petrol, because what it leaves behind does not rinse out on its own. Your filter is flushed, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and the vehicle is tested. Engine not run? In that case expect roughly half an hour on site for most jobs. Quiet enough for use outside a house at night, and fine on a working forecourt, the pumps are explosion-proof.
Last, the system is bled with clean diesel. Firing it up comes next, and then you drive off from where the car is parked, outside the nearest station or on a drive in Higher Town. It's tested on clean diesel to make sure it runs smoothly before our technicians head off. We do it all wherever the vehicle has stopped, and it never needs to go to a garage. Afterwards, there is the paperwork for your insurer: a VAT invoice plus a report from the engineer.
About Higher Town
Higher Town is a suburban area situated on the coast of Somerset, with nearby towns including Minehead and Periton. Higher Town has a relatively low elevation of 64 metres and is located near the villages of Woodcombe. Higher Town is characterized by a high proportion of flat housing, reflecting its development as a residential area.
AdBlue drains across Somerset, Higher Town included
Minehead, Periton and Woodcombe are among the towns near Higher Town that the same teams reach, together with much of Somerset further out, over the TA postcode area. Near a border, or somewhere awkward to explain? Checking is better than guessing, and so phone.
Wherever your car stands — your driveway at home, a residential street, a parking area, a forecourt — our engineers drain it on the spot, with no need to bring it to us; which suits Higher Town, a residential suburb, well.
What does AdBlue in a diesel tank cost to sort out around Higher Town?
Each job is different, and so no fixed price would be honest. Whether the engine has run, and for how long, comes first in what shifts the price. How much AdBlue got in comes next, and then the position of the car, since an open drive is simpler for a technician to reach safely than a tight gap behind Zigzag footpath.
Ahead of any figure, not after, every call from Higher Town begins with three questions: the fuel, the quantity, plus whether it ran. When those are known, a range becomes a single fixed number.
Before anyone heads out, you are told our quote on the phone. And you pay on the day, card or over the phone, with nothing in advance. Misfuelling cover is part of many insurance policies, so it is worth looking at yours before the van arrives.
Still alongside your car in Higher Town?
Then, do nothing — that is the most helpful move available. Keys out; motor and ignition off. Ring 0333 366 0103: AdBlue, the amount, plus whether it ran is everything we ask. Petrol in Diesel takes over the rest throughout Somerset, Higher Town too.