--- title: Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank Ilchester canonical: https://www.petrolinadieselcar.co.uk/adblue-in-diesel/ilchester-somerset/ location: Ilchester county: Somerset latitude: 51.002020 longitude: -2.682750 service: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank updated: 2026-10-16 --- # Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Ilchester With AdBlue in the diesel tank, the ignition stays off and so does the engine. Chemically, AdBlue is just urea in water. As it is water-based, it will not ignite and won't blend with diesel; trouble just starts once your pump starts pulling it. In Ilchester, AdBlue in a diesel tank caught before your engine runs normally comes down to a drain and a thorough flush, right where your car is. Before anything, phone us on 0333 366 0103. ## Your next steps straight away, Ilchester: AdBlue in your diesel tank To do: - Keys out — then no one can power anything on. - Put the hazards on if you're anywhere near moving traffic. - So you can tell us which fluid it was and about what quantity, save the till receipt or the empty bottle. - Call us from where you are. A postcode starting BA22 8, or the name of the nearest street, brings our van to you without a search. Not to do: - Don't start your engine, even for a moment to move the vehicle. - Many diesels run their fuel pump the moment your ignition comes on, and so leave it off. - No extra fuel added. The AdBlue will not blend, and so it's wasted. - Even a short stretch down Market Place is too far to drive the vehicle. - Do not try to drain the vehicle yourself at the roadside. At a forecourt in Ilchester, whether it's the Texaco or another one, ask the attendants to help you roll the vehicle clear of the petrol pump. Stopped on your own drive? Then it stays exactly as it is. ## What AdBlue does in a diesel tank Made for your exhaust, AdBlue has no place in the engine. Its own tank keeps it, and from there it is fed into your exhaust, and there it cleans the gas. A fuel pump isn't designed to cope with it, and AdBlue was never supposed to travel through one. Inside a diesel tank it acts really differently from fuel. It doesn't mix in. The intake sucks fuel from the lowest part of that tank, and that's exactly where AdBlue settles: as it is denser than diesel, it sinks. Once your pump runs, the AdBlue is top of the list to go through. Before then it sits beneath your diesel, which is how a car filled in Yeovilton yesterday and never started stays the straightforward case, as long as nobody touches the key. Once it's sucked in, the damage takes two forms. What remains once the water goes is urea, which forms crystals: they lodge in narrow channels and clog filters. On top of that, it eats at certain metals in a fuel system, and keeps going till it's cleared out. Lines carrying AdBlue spell damage overnight for a car sitting around Ilchester. Just in the tank, it stays the same. Then there's the water: it offers no lubrication to the components that need it most — the high-pressure pump and each injector. ## AdBlue in a diesel: why it's often worse than petrol Fill a diesel with petrol in error over at the Esso, and the problem is thinned fuel. Mixed through the diesel and left still, it is harmless for now; running your engine is the damage. 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 tankful, and AdBlue separates again out of the diesel, and so watering it can't work. Hence the flush matters more, and trying your engine "to see" does more harm with AdBlue than nearly any other mistake — in Draycott or the centre of Ilchester alike. As with petrol, there's good news. If the motor has not run, the AdBlue is still inside the tank, and the tank is the easiest part of a fuel system to clear, wherever around Somerset the vehicle is sitting. ## How AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank in Ilchester Nobody means to do it. The AdBlue filler on many motors rests right next to your diesel filler, sometimes under the same flap, and the two caps can look alike in poor light. Mostly it takes place with a bottle bought on the way home and poured in on the drive, not at the pump. Usually, it occurs in one of a few familiar ways. Hurrying, outside Ilchester Community School, after a warning lamp flashed on during the school run, someone refills your car. A driver pours the bottle in outside their house, just off High Street, as the day ends. Else, after dark outside The Bull Inn, your vehicle is topped up by a driver using that flap the first time. It comes up the most in a rental, a new motor, a fleet car, or the spare car in a home with both fuels — the vehicles drivers know the least. Wherever across Somerset, Ilchester included, the mistake doesn't change, and nor does the first step: keep it off. ## Ilchester: started the engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank? Then the AdBlue has left your tank. It's been sucked through the fuel filter and your lines, and if your engine ran for any time, it has reached your high-pressure pump and your injectors. Expect rough running, exhaust smoke, lost power, lights on the dash, or a cut-out — returning from Town Square, perhaps, or midway across Ilchester. Stop as soon as it is safe, switch off, and do not restart the vehicle to check. Each start pulls more of it through. Ilchester sits under 25 miles from the M5; if you were on it, leave at the first junction and pull up safely instead of carrying on. A quick hop across Ilchester to the car park by Ilchester Town Hall is one thing; driving for Wells, under 15 miles away, is another, since every mile pushes the AdBlue deeper in. So distance matters. Let us know roughly how far it had come. There's more to rinse out once your engine has been started, and our technicians do all of it where your car has come to a stop. If it is noticed quickly, permanent damage is very unusual. ## Ilchester: how AdBlue is drained from a diesel We come to the car, wherever it has stopped in Ilchester: a side street close to Ilchester Museum, a drive, a lay-by or a forecourt. The job rests on three replies, and our engineers get first — what went in, the amount, and if your motor has run. Then the tank is cleared where the vehicle waits, and so the contaminated fuel and the AdBlue come out together. A careful flush counts much more with AdBlue than after petrol, since residue won't wash out by itself. After that, the fuel filter: flushed, or replaced if it has to be. After that fresh diesel, then a test of your vehicle. Not run? Then expect about half an hour once we are there for most jobs. Our equipment is explosion-proof, and so a busy filling station is no issue, and it is quiet enough for a residential street after dark. Bleeding the fuel system with new diesel comes at the end. Firing it up comes next, and then you head off from where the vehicle is parked, by Yeovil Pen Mill or on a driveway in Ilchester. Before leaving, our technicians check it is running smoothly with clean diesel in. As the job is done in full where your car is, a garage never comes into it. At the end, you are given paperwork for your insurer: a VAT invoice plus a report from the engineer. ## About Ilchester and where it is Ilchester is a village situated on the River Yeo in Somerset, with a low elevation of around 15 metres above sea level. Ilchester lies near the towns of Yeovil and Wells, and is close to the nearby places of Northover, Ilchester Mead, and Limington. Ilchester has a population of approximately 1164 people, and its housing stock is predominantly made up of terraced homes. Ilchester is located in the South West region of England, around 115.9 miles west of London. ## AdBlue drains across Somerset, Ilchester included AdBlue jobs around Ilchester go to teams that cover the towns near it — Northover, Ilchester Mead as well as Limington — and much of Somerset beyond, across BA postcodes. Phone and ask rather than guess when you're by a border, or anywhere awkward to explain. Anywhere the vehicle sits — a driveway at home, a residential street, a car park, a forecourt — our technicians drain it on the spot, and there's no need to bring it to us; that suits Ilchester, a village, well. ## AdBlue in a diesel tank around Ilchester: the cost of fixing it No flat figure would be fair, because every job differs. What moves the cost is, first, whether the motor has run and for how long; then how much AdBlue got in; and after that where the car is and whether a van can get to it safely, which is easier on an open drive than in a tight spot behind Lindinis. What got in, how much, plus whether the engine ran: each Ilchester enquiry opens by asking exactly those, ahead of any figure, never afterwards. Once they are answered, a range turns into a single fixed number. The quote is given on the call, before anyone leaves; settling up happens on the day, by card or over the phone, with nothing upfront. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it's worth checking yours while we're on the way. ## Beside the car in Ilchester, still? Then the most helpful thing you can do is nothing to your car. Ignition off, motor off, keys out. Ring 0333 366 0103: AdBlue, roughly how much, plus whether it ran are all we ask. Petrol in Diesel takes over the rest across Somerset, Ilchester included.