AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Kells? Don't Start It
With AdBlue in your diesel tank, your ignition stays off and so does your motor. Urea dissolved in water is what AdBlue is. Unlike fuel, it neither ignites nor blends, and nothing starts till the motor sucks it through. If your engine hasn't run yet, AdBlue in a diesel tank is generally emptied and carefully flushed where your car sits around Kells. Before you do anything else, call 0333 366 0103.
Those opening minutes: AdBlue in the diesel tank in Kells
To do:
- Keys out — then no one can power anything on.
- Hazards on, if moving traffic is anywhere near.
- The empty bottle or the receipt tells us the fluid and the quantity, and so do not throw it away.
- Call just where you are. Say a CA28 9 postcode or the closest street name, and no one has to search for you.
Never do these:
- Not even briefly, and not to shift the car: the motor remains off.
- Switching the key to ignition by itself sets the pump going on many diesels. Skip it.
- Don't top up with diesel to dilute it. AdBlue doesn't dilute in diesel; it separates out.
- Any driving at all is best avoided, including a short stretch up Cliff Road.
- Draining the tank on your own by the road isn't worth trying.
The staff on duty at any Kells forecourt — the Morrisons among them — will normally help pushing it clear if you ask. Parked on your own driveway? Then it remains just where it is.
What does AdBlue do in a diesel tank?
Meant for your exhaust, AdBlue has no business in your engine. From a separate reservoir it goes straight to your exhaust, treating what the motor emits. Nothing inside an injection pump is designed for this liquid — and none of that was intended to go through one.
Tipped in with your diesel, it keeps separate instead of blending — quite unlike fuel. Denser than diesel, it sinks and pools underneath it — the very place the pickup draws from. A vehicle topped up on a driveway in Whitehaven yesterday evening and not started since counts as the straightforward one. Nothing has pulled the AdBlue up yet — though once your engine runs, that is what is pulled first, straight from the bottom of your tank.
After it's sucked in, the harm takes two forms. As its water goes, the urea left behind crystallises, and the crystals block filters and settle in fine passages. And it's corrosive to some of the metals a fuel system is made from, and so it keeps labouring on the parts it hits for as long as it stays there. Lines holding AdBlue spell harm overnight for a vehicle sitting in Kells. Just inside your tank, it stays the same. Diesel protects the injection pump and every injector as it passes; water gives no lubrication, which is a second form of harm.
Petrol or AdBlue in a diesel: why AdBlue is frequently worse
A problem of thin fuel is what you get from filling a diesel with petrol from the Esso. It mixes with the diesel, and while it's inside that tank it does no damage; the damage comes from running the engine on it.
The trouble with AdBlue in a diesel is a completely wrong substance. Since it doesn't burn, running it through isn't an option. It does not stay mixed, so it cannot be weakened. And crystals and corrosion don't wash out with the next tank of fuel. That is why the flush matters more with AdBlue than with petrol, and why starting the motor "to see" costs more here than nearly anywhere else, whether your car is in Greenbank or the middle of Kells.
As with petrol, there's good news. Anywhere around Cumbria your car has stopped, an unstarted engine leaves the AdBlue yet inside the reservoir: the easiest part of a fuel system to empty.
How AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank around Kells
It's not on purpose. Many cars keep the AdBlue cap beside the diesel inlet, occasionally behind a single flap, and muddling them up is simple after dark. A container picked up when driving home and tipped in at home, rather than at the filling station, is the usual story.
Usually, it takes place in one of a couple of familiar ways. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up happens in a hurry outside Kells Infant School. After work, a bottle goes in on a driveway close to York Road. Another version: darkness, the car park by Kells Royal British Legion, and someone opening that flap for the first time.
It comes up most in a rental, a new car, a company motor, or the spare car of a family with one of each fuel types — the cars people use least. Anywhere around Cumbria, Kells included, the slip does not change, and neither does the first step: keep it off.
AdBlue in your diesel tank around Kells, and the engine started?
In that case, the AdBlue is no longer inside your tank. It's been sucked through the fuel filter and your lines, and if the motor ran for any time, it has reached your high-pressure pump and the injectors.
Rough running, smoke, dropping power, dashboard lights or cutting out: any might appear, maybe midway across Kells or returning from Arrowthwaite Wood. No restarting to check: stop when safe, then switch everything off. Every start pulls more of it through.
If you were on the M6, under 50 miles from Kells, come off at the next junction and stop somewhere sensible instead of pressing on.
Mileage matters: each mile carries the AdBlue further into the system, and so driving towards Carlisle, under 50 miles away, makes a far larger job than crossing Kells to the car park by St Peter's. Roughly how far it had come is worth telling us.
Our technicians do all of the rinsing where the car has stopped, and once the engine has run there is more of it. Caught quickly, it very rarely leaves long-term damage.
What emptying AdBlue from a diesel involves around Kells
The car stays where it is, whether that is a street beside St Mary's, a driveway, a layby or a filling station around Kells, and the van travels to it. What went in, roughly how much, and if your engine has been run: our technicians check before all else, because those shape the job.
Right there, that tank is then emptied, and all of the contaminated diesel and the urea come out as one. A full flush matters much more after AdBlue than with petrol, since what remains won't clear out by itself. The filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and the vehicle is tested. About half an hour once we arrive is usual for most jobs when the motor hasn't run. The pumps are explosion-proof, fine on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark.
Finally, your system is bled with clean diesel. You head off as soon as we have started it, and it makes no difference whether your car is on a drive in Kells or in a bay outside Corkickle. The test before our technicians leave is that it runs smoothly on fresh diesel. As the job is done in its entirety where your car is, a workshop never comes into it. Insurers ask for a VAT invoice and an engineer report, and you get both at the end.
About Kells
Kells is a suburban area located on the coast of Cumbria, with Kells sitting at an elevation of around 90 metres above sea level. Kells forms part of a larger residential area, characterised by semi-detached housing, and is situated near other local places such as Arrowthwaite and Woodhouse. Kells is also close to Corkickle and is within commuting distance of Carlisle, which is 36 miles away. Kells is approximately 254 miles from London, making it a relatively remote suburban area in the North West of England.
AdBlue drains across Kells and Cumbria
Arrowthwaite, Woodhouse and Corkickle are among the towns around Kells that the same teams serve, together with most of Cumbria beyond, throughout the CA postcode area. Ring and check rather than guess when you're close to a border, or anywhere awkward to pin down.
Anywhere the car stands — your drive at home, a side street, a parking area, a filling station — we empty it on the spot, and there's no need to bring it to us; which suits Kells, a residential suburb, well.
AdBlue in a diesel tank in Kells: the cost of fixing it
There's no honest single quote, since the jobs aren't the same. Three things move the price: whether the engine has been running and for how long, how much AdBlue was put in, and where the car is. That last one rests on whether a van can get to it safely, and an open drive is easier than a tight space behind Saltom Pit.
That's why every call from Kells starts with the same three queries, asked before giving a figure, not after: what got in, how much, and whether it's run. Those answers narrow the range right down to one figure.
Quoted by phone before the engineer heads out, the job is settled on the day — card or phone, nothing in advance. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it's worth checking yours whilst we're on the way.
In Kells and still next to your car?
In that case, do nothing — that is the most helpful move available. Motor off, keys out, ignition off. Ring 0333 366 0103 then tell us it is AdBlue, about how much, and whether it has run. Petrol in Diesel takes it from there, around Kells or anywhere around Cumbria.