Hook Street: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Avoid It?
Leave the engine and ignition off then phone 0333 366 0103 now — reading can wait if AdBlue is already in the diesel tank. Caught before your engine runs, it's generally a drain and a thorough flush, done where the vehicle is around Hook Street. Not happened yet? Below, the page explains the why it takes place and the ways to avoid it altogether.
AdBlue in a diesel car: two tanks, two fillers
Many newer diesels around Lydiard Millicent, like those in Hook Street, run on two fluids; your motor takes only your diesel. Your exhaust, not your motor, is where AdBlue ends up: dosed into the gas to fresh it, from its own tank.
There's a filler on each tank. Under one flap, next to each other: that is the arrangement on a lot of motors. On others, AdBlue's filler is under the bonnet or in the boot instead. Diesel gets filled at each filling station call-out, week in, week out. Someone who has to stop and think where it goes usually tops up the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and much less regularly. That gap is where the slip lives.
Hook Street: how AdBlue in your diesel tank happens
It is rarely carelessness. Three things tend to line up.
Hurry comes from the warning. The car warns you as AdBlue runs low, and a dry tank sends it into limp mode — so the top-up gets done quickly, before work on a driveway off Lydiard Residential Park, or on the way home in the car park outside The Bolingbroke Arms.
Then the vehicle is strange. A hire car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers where your last one did not, and your hand gets to for the cap it would have used on the old one.
A spouted bottle finds no obstacle at a diesel filler any more than at an AdBlue one. So the pour, after started, keeps on. Hook or the middle of Hook Street: it is the same few seconds either way.
Which filler is for AdBlue, and which for diesel?
Before you tip anything, whether on a drive in Coped Hall or a forecourt in Hook Street, check these. They take a couple of seconds.
- The cap. The AdBlue cap is often blue, or marked "AdBlue". Your diesel cap normally isn't. Read it rather than going by position.
- Plenty of cars give AdBlue the smaller neck of the two.
- A label inside the fuel flap frequently says which fuel goes where, on many motors. Look for it.
- In the boot or under the bonnet: that is where the filler is if it's not by the diesel cap, and the handbook tells you which.
- 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 Swindon.
Keeping AdBlue out of your diesel tank when you top up
When the light comes on, anywhere in Wiltshire, follow this routine.
- Not in a rush on the side of M4, not on a slope, not with the engine running: park then switch off properly.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds daft and it works.
- If both sit under one flap, check the diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — and leave the vehicle on.
- Using the bottle's own spout, pour slowly — and stop when it is full or the bottle is empty.
- Close the cap and check once more. Make sure the diesel cap was never opened. Only then start the vehicle.
Stop there if you find, at stage two or three, that you've already poured into your diesel side. Never go on to stage five.
Put AdBlue in your diesel tank in Hook Street already?
Then the order of things is short. Do not start the engine. On many diesels your ignition alone runs the fuel pump, and so don't switch the car on. Do not top up with diesel to dilute it: AdBlue does not mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of the tank, where the fuel is sucked from.
On a forecourt — Esso, BP or another — the staff will usually help push the vehicle away, if you ask. Leave it where it is if you are on your own drive around Hook Street.
Where the engine has been run already, stop safely and turn the vehicle off. The next exit is the place to come off if you are on the M4, under a mile from Hook Street. About how far did it go? Hopping across Hook Street is smaller a job than a run of under 25 miles towards Bath, so say.
Hook Street: what happens when we turn up
Anywhere your car has stopped, be it outside Lydiard Millicent CofE Primary School, beside Hook Village Hall or at home, the van comes to it. Our engineers ask what got in, about how much, and if it's run, because the answers determine this work and our quote. No one sets off before you've had our price by phone.
After that: a drain, then a full flush of the entire system. Not like petrol, AdBlue forms crystals and attacks some fuel-system metals, and neither clears away unaided. That is why it counts more. Testing comes at the end: before that, clean diesel goes in, and the filter is cleaned or changed as needed. The motor is started next and tested to confirm it runs correctly, all before our engineers head off.
Most jobs are finished in about half an hour once our engineers arrive, as long as your engine hasn't run — and the pumps our engineers use are safe on a busy forecourt yet quiet at night outside a house. Paying happens on the day, not upfront, and you are given the documents your insurer asks for: an engineer report and a VAT invoice. Misfuelling cover is included in many insurance policies — so make use of the wait to check yours.
About Hook Street, briefly
Hook Street is a small village in Wiltshire, situated on the riverside at an elevation of 129 metres, with detached housing being the predominant type of accommodation. Hook Street lies near the villages of Hook and Lydiard Green, and is within commuting distance of the city of Bath, which is 24 miles away. Hook Street remains a quiet residential community with a population of around 531 people. Hook Street is also close to other nearby places such as Greatfield, and is about 75 miles west of London.
Hook Street and Wiltshire: AdBlue drains across the area
Being a village, Hook Street has the same vans as nearby places — Lydiard Green, Greatfield — all the way through SN postcodes and the wider area beyond. Our van reaches you fastest with a postcode starting SN4 8.
No need to shift the car. Our engineers drain it where it is — a side street close to Lydiard Millicent Parish Hall, a lay-by on the way to Park Copse, a driveway. Ring and ask instead of guessing if you are near a border, or somewhere hard to describe, like the back of Jungle Parc.
The short version for Hook Street drivers
Tip nothing until you have read the cap. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it stands, anywhere in Wiltshire, if AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank anyway — so leave the car off then phone 0333 366 0103.