Hundon: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Prevent It?
Pause reading a minute when your diesel tank already holds AdBlue in it: ignition off, engine off, then ring 0333 366 0103. A drain and a full flush, carried out just where the vehicle sits around Hundon, is usually what it takes when caught before the engine runs. If you're reading before it has happened, the rest of this page is about why it occurs and how to make sure it doesn't.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel car need its own filler?
Diesel goes to your engine — but many newer diesels seen around Hundon and Brockley Green carry another liquid as well. AdBlue's own tank holds it, and from there it is sent to your exhaust, and there a spray cleans the fumes.
There's a filler on every tank. Under one flap, side by side: that is the arrangement on many motors. Elsewhere, AdBlue's filler sits under the bonnet or in the boot instead. Diesel goes in on every forecourt visit, week in, week out. Rarely topped up, AdBlue usually goes in out of a bottle, tipped by a driver who must stop and think which cap it needs. Mistakes happen in the gap between them.
How does AdBlue in your diesel tank occur in Hundon?
Three things tend to line up, and carelessness is seldom one of them.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low the vehicle tells you, and if it runs out completely, the car goes into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a driveway off Church Street before work, or in the car park outside Rose and Crown on the way home.
Next, your hand goes for the cap it would have used on the old vehicle — since a hire car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers somewhere your last one didn't.
Nothing stops the tip once it has started, because a bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one. The bottle fits. Babel Green or the middle of Hundon: it takes the same few seconds either way.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Check these before pouring, at a forecourt in Hundon or a drive over in Barnardiston. Seconds, that's all.
- Check the cap rather than going by position: AdBlue caps are frequently blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel caps usually are not.
- The size. On many vehicles the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- Open the filler flap and look for a label — plenty of vehicles show what goes in which inlet just there.
- The handbook says which it is when the filler is not next to the diesel cap: your boot, or under the bonnet.
- Whoever had it before knows. Check as you pick up a hire car or fleet car — from Dullingham's car park, perhaps — not when the light comes on.
Keeping AdBlue out of the diesel tank when you top up
The day the light comes on, anywhere across Suffolk, use this routine.
- Park then switch off. Not on a slope, not with the engine running, and not in a rush on the side of North Street.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds silly and it works.
- Both behind a single flap? Then make sure the cap on your diesel filler stays closed ahead of lifting the bottle.
- Using the bottle's own spout, tip slowly — and stop when it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Only after that, start the vehicle: close the cap, check a second time, and make sure your diesel cap was never opened.
If at stage two or three you find you have already poured into your diesel side, stop there. Do not go on to stage five.
Put AdBlue in the diesel tank around Hundon already?
The short order of things, beginning with no starting your motor. On many diesels your ignition alone runs the fuel pump, so don't switch the car on. Topping up with diesel will not thin it: rather than mixing, AdBlue sinks to the bottom of that tank, just where fuel is taken from.
If you're on a forecourt, whether it is the the nearest petrol station or the Thurlow Motors, ask the staff to help push the car away from the pump. If you are on your own drive around Hundon, leave the vehicle where it is.
Already started? Pull over when it's sensible, then turn off. On the M11, under 15 miles from Hundon, that means the next exit. A short hop across Hundon is a smaller job than a run towards Cambridge, under 25 miles away, so tell us about how far it went.
Hundon: what happens when our engineers turn up
We come to the vehicle wherever it has stopped, whether that is outside Hundon Community Primary School, close to Hundon Village Sign or on your own driveway. Both the work and our quote rest on three replies — what liquid, what quantity, and whether it has run — so our engineers ask. During the call itself, you hear our quote — ahead of dispatch.
Draining that tank comes next, then a thorough flush of the system. With AdBlue that counts more than with petrol: it crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it does not wash out on its own. After your filter is cleaned — or renewed, if required — clean diesel goes in, and then your vehicle gets tested. We do not leave until it has been fired up and is running smoothly.
Unstarted cars mostly need a half-hour visit from the moment we arrive. The equipment is fine on a busy forecourt, and hushed enough for a residential street after dark. Nothing upfront; you settle up on the day. Afterwards, the VAT invoice and a report from the engineer go to you for your insurer. While we travel, take a look at your insurance documents; plenty carry cover for misfuelling.
About Hundon, briefly
Hundon is a rural village in Suffolk, situated inland at an elevation of around 86 metres. Hundon lies approximately 50 miles from London and 19 miles from Cambridge, with nearby places including Babel Green, Mount Pleasant, and Chimney Street. Hundon has a population of around 816 people and is characterised by predominantly detached housing.
Hundon and Suffolk: AdBlue drains across the area
Mount Pleasant and Chimney Street are among the places near Hundon, a rural village, that the same vans cover, over CO postcodes. Quickest of all: give a CO10 8 postcode for the van.
The car doesn't need to move. Wherever it sits — beside Hundon War Memorial, in a lay-by heading to Three Cocked Hat, on a drive — that's where it is emptied. Guessing won't help at the back of All Saints' Church, Hundon, close to a boundary, or anywhere awkward to describe; ring and ask.
Hundon drivers: the short version
Always, the cap; then, the tip. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank all the same, leave the car off then call 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it waits, anywhere across Suffolk.