How It Happens and How to Avoid It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Inverkip
AdBlue already in your diesel tank? Then put this page down for now, keep the ignition and engine off, then phone 0333 366 0103. Usually, if the engine has not turned, it's emptied and thoroughly rinsed where the vehicle is in Inverkip. Reading before the event? Then the rest explains how it happens and what to prevent it happening at all.
AdBlue in a diesel car: two tanks, two fillers
No single liquid but two: that is what many modern diesels around Inverkip and Upper Skelmorlie carry, with diesel for your engine. AdBlue's own tank holds it, and from there it is sent to the exhaust, and there spraying treats the gas.
Each tank has its own filler. Some cars put the AdBlue filler in your boot or under the bonnet; plenty more have the two together behind one flap. The diesel side is fuelled at the petrol pump all the time. Far less frequently, the AdBlue side is topped up — normally from a bottle, by a person thinking about where it goes. That gap is where the error lives.
AdBlue in the diesel tank around Inverkip: how it occurs
Carelessness seldom causes it. Instead is three things coming up together.
Haste comes from the warning. The car warns you as AdBlue runs low, and a dry tank puts the vehicle into limp mode — so the top-up happens in a rush, before work on a drive off Station Avenue, or on the way home in the car park at the pub in the village.
Then the vehicle is unfamiliar. A hire car, a new car or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't, and the hand reaches for the cap it would have used on the old one.
No part halts 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. The same few seconds settle it, in the middle of Inverkip or out in Bridgend.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Before you pour anything, whether on a driveway in Braeside or a forecourt in Inverkip, check these. They take a few seconds.
- Colour and lettering: an AdBlue cap is regularly blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap usually does not. Go by the cap, not where it sits.
- Many vehicles give AdBlue the smaller filler of the two.
- The flap. Look inside the fuel flap for a label. Plenty of cars say there which fuel goes where.
- The handbook shows which it lives when the filler isn't next to your diesel cap: the boot, or under the bonnet.
- The person who drove it last. On a hire or company car picked up from somewhere like the car park outside the nearest station, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching the diesel tank
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever across Inverclyde that is.
- Not in a rush on the side of Fran Terrace, not on a slope, not with the engine running: park and switch off first.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds silly and it works.
- The two behind one flap? Then confirm the lid on the diesel side is still closed before raising the bottle.
- Tip slowly, using the bottle's own spout. Stop when it's full or when the bottle is empty.
- Shut the cap, and look once more — confirm the diesel cap remained shut throughout. After that, start the vehicle.
Discover during the second or third step that the bottle went into the diesel filler? That is where you stop. Don't go on to step five.
Put AdBlue in your diesel tank in Inverkip already?
Then the order of things is short. Don't start the engine. Do not switch the ignition on; on many diesels that alone runs the fuel pump. Topping up with diesel won't dilute it: rather than mixing, AdBlue sinks to the base of the tank, right where fuel is drawn from.
If you are on a forecourt, whether it is the Gulf or the BP, ask the attendants to help roll your car away from the pump. Your own drive around Inverkip is where it should stay.
Where your engine has run already, pull over somewhere safe then turn the car off. Inverkip lies under 15 miles from the M8; there, use the first exit. Tell us about how far it went: a run towards Glasgow, under 25 miles away, is a bigger job than a short hop across Inverkip.
When our technicians turn up in Inverkip, what occurs?
Our technicians come to the vehicle wherever it has stopped, whether that is outside the local primary school, close to War Memorial or on your own driveway. What fluid got in, the amount, and if it ran: our engineers ask since the replies set the work and quote. That quote comes on the call, ahead of any van leaving.
Then that tank is drained and your system purged thoroughly. With AdBlue that matters more than with petrol: it crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, and so it does not wash out on its own. Filter flushed or, if it must be, replaced; clean diesel in; then a test of your car. Before we go, our technicians start the car and confirm that it's running smoothly.
If your motor hasn't run, the majority of jobs take about half an hour once we are there, using pumps that are fine on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark. You pay on the day, with nothing upfront, and get a VAT invoice and an engineer report for your insurer. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it's worth checking yours whilst we're on the way.
About Inverkip and where it is
Inverkip is a coastal village in Inverclyde, situated on the Firth of Clyde at an elevation of around 10 metres. Inverkip lies near the towns of Wemyss Bay and Bridgend, and is close to Drumillan Hill. Inverkip has a population of approximately 1661 people, predominantly living in detached housing.
AdBlue drains round Inverkip, and Inverclyde beyond
Inverkip is a coastal village, and the teams that cover it also work the places around it, Wemyss Bay and Drumillan Hill among them, across the PA postcode area. Quickest of all: give a PA16 0 postcode to the van.
There's no need to move the vehicle. Draining happens on the spot, whether a driveway, a street near Ardgowan Castle, or a lay-by on the way to Crowhill Wood. Tricky to pin down, like the back of St Joseph's and St Patrick's Church? By a border? Checking is better than assuming, so phone.
In short, for Inverkip drivers
Pour no AdBlue until you've read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank all the same, leave the vehicle off and call 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it sits, anywhere around Inverclyde.