How It Happens and How to Prevent It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Hook End
Pause reading a minute when your diesel tank already holds AdBlue in it: ignition off, motor off, then call 0333 366 0103. In Hook End, finding it before your engine turns usually leaves draining and a full flush on the spot. Nothing happened yet? Below, the page covers the why it occurs and the ways to avoid it altogether.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle, and its separate tank
Many newer diesels on the roads about Hook End and Stondon Massey carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to your engine. Its own tank keeps it, and from there it goes to your exhaust, and there a spray cleans the gas.
Every tank comes with one filler of its own. Some vehicles keep the AdBlue filler in your boot or under the bonnet; plenty of others have both together under one flap. Diesel gets filled on each forecourt visit, again and again. Much less regularly, the AdBlue side gets topped up — mostly from a bottle, by someone working out where it goes. Mistakes happen in that gap between the two.
Hook End: how AdBlue in the diesel tank happens
It's rarely carelessness. Three things tend to line up.
On a driveway off Hook End Lane before work, or in the car park at Bricklayers Arms on the way home: that's where the hurried top-up happens. Why the rush? As AdBlue runs low the car warns you, and if it is empty, limp mode kicks in.
Then, the hand reaches for the cap it would have used on the old motor — because a hire car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers somewhere your last one did not.
And the bottle fits. A bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one, and so nothing stops the tip after it has started. The same few seconds settle it, in the middle of Hook End or out in Stondon Green.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Whether a Hook End forecourt or a drive over in Clapgate, take a few seconds over these before any goes in.
- Read the cap instead of going by position: AdBlue caps are regularly blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel caps usually are not.
- Look at the size: the smaller filler neck is, on plenty of vehicles, the AdBlue one.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Many motors say there which fuel goes where.
- The handbook. If the filler isn't by your diesel cap, it's in your boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- The previous driver knows. Check as you collect a hire car or fleet car — at Shenfield's car park, perhaps — rather than once the light comes on.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach the diesel tank
Wherever across Essex the light comes on, this is a routine for the day.
- Pull in somewhere level, motor off, with time to spare — never hurried on the side of Second Avenue.
- Silly as it sounds, speaking "AdBlue" out loud while you unscrew the cap works — after you've located the filler and read it.
- Leave the diesel cap on. If both sit under one flap, check the diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle.
- Gently is best, through the bottle's own spout, till it is full or the bottle runs out.
- Close the cap and check once more. Make sure your diesel cap was never opened. Only then start your car.
Find at the second or third stage that AdBlue went in the diesel filler? That's where you stop. Do not go on to stage five.
AdBlue in your diesel tank already, around Hook End?
The short order of things, starting with not starting your motor. The fuel pump starts on plenty of diesels as soon as your ignition goes on — so leave it off. Topping up with diesel will not dilute it: instead, AdBlue drops to the base of that tank, right where fuel is taken from.
At a forecourt — Applegreen, BP or any other — the attendants will normally help roll the car clear, when you ask. Your own driveway in Hook End is where it should stay.
Already run? Pull over once it's safe, then turn off. Leave the M25 — under 5 miles out of Hook End — at the next exit. About how far did it go? Crossing Hook End is smaller work than a run of under 10 miles towards Chelmsford, and so tell us.
What takes place when our engineers get there in Hook End
Our engineers come to the vehicle wherever it has stopped, whether that's outside Doddinghurst Infant School, near All Saints, Doddinghurst or on your own drive. What fluid was put in, the amount, and if it ran: our technicians ask since the replies set the work and price. You hear that price by phone, before anybody sets off.
Draining the tank comes next, then a full flush of your system. Not like petrol, AdBlue leaves crystals and attacks certain fuel-system metals, and neither clears away unaided. Hence it counts more. After your filter has been flushed — or replaced, where needed — fresh diesel is added, and finally the vehicle is tested. The motor is started next and checked to be sure it runs smoothly, all before our technicians head off.
Unstarted vehicles mostly mean a half-hour visit from the moment we arrive. The kit is fine on a busy forecourt, and quiet enough for a driveway late at night. The insurer usually wants an engineer's report and your VAT invoice, and you get both at the end. Payment is on the day, with no deposit. It's worth checking your policy while we travel to you: misfuelling cover comes with many policies.
About Hook End
Hook End is a small village in Essex, situated inland at an elevation of around 95 metres, and is located near the larger city of Chelmsford. Hook End has a population of approximately 946 residents and is characterised by predominantly detached housing. Hook End is also close to other nearby places such as Stondon Green, Tips Cross, and Wyatts Green, and is about 21.8 miles from London.
AdBlue drains around Hook End and across Essex
Tips Cross and Wyatts Green are among the towns near Hook End, a rural village, that the same teams cover, throughout CM postcodes. A postcode starting CM15 0 gets our van to you fastest.
There's no need to move the car. A driveway, a lay-by on the way to Stondon Green, a side street close to Doddinghurst Village Hall: our engineers drain the vehicle where it is. If you are near a border, or somewhere hard to describe like the back of St Margaret's Church, ring and ask rather than assuming.
The short version for Hook End motorists
First, the cap; then, the tip. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it stands, anywhere across Essex, if AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank anyway — so leave the car off then call 0333 366 0103.