Kenton: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Prevent It?
Pause here for a moment when the diesel tank already has AdBlue in it: ignition off, motor off, then ring 0333 366 0103. Around Kenton, finding it before the motor runs usually leaves draining and a thorough flush on the spot. Here before the event? Then the rest covers why it happens and how to prevent it ever happening.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle, and its separate tank
Plenty of modern diesels in Belmont, as well as Kenton, run on two fluids; the engine takes only your diesel. Kept in a tank of its own, AdBlue is sprayed into the exhaust stream and cleans it.
Each tank has its own filler. On a lot of vehicles the two sit side by side under the same flap; on others the AdBlue filler is in the boot or under the bonnet. Filling the diesel side at the pump goes on constantly. Far less commonly, the AdBlue side gets filled — mostly from a bottle, by someone thinking about where it goes. The mistake lives in that gap.
How AdBlue in the diesel tank happens around Kenton
Carelessness rarely causes it. Instead is three things coming up together.
Haste comes from the warning. Your car tells you as AdBlue runs low, and an empty tank puts the vehicle into limp mode — so the top-up happens in a rush, before work on a drive off Kenton Road, or on the way home in the car park at Fizz Sports Bar.
Next, your hand reaches for the cap it knew on the old vehicle — since a hire car, a new vehicle or a company car places the fillers where your last one did not.
And the bottle fits. A bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one, and so nothing stops the pour after it has started. The same few seconds settle it, in the middle of Kenton or out in Greenhill.
Telling the AdBlue filler from the diesel filler
Whether a Kenton forecourt or a driveway out in Wealdstone, take a few seconds over these before anything is poured in.
- Read the cap rather than going by where it sits: AdBlue ones are commonly blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel ones usually aren't.
- Many motors fit AdBlue the smaller filler of the two.
- A label inside your fuel flap often says which fuel goes where, on many vehicles. Look for it.
- The handbook says where it is when the filler isn't next to your diesel cap: your boot, or under the bonnet.
- Whoever had it before will know. Check when you pick up a rental or company car — from the nearest station's car park, say — rather than once the warning appears.
How to top up without AdBlue in your diesel tank
Anywhere across Greater London the light comes on, this is a routine for that day.
- Not in a rush on the side of Carlton Avenue, not on a slope, not with your motor running: park and switch off properly.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds silly and it does the trick.
- The diesel cap stays on. Where both share a flap, make sure it is closed before lifting the bottle.
- Slowly is best, through the bottle's own spout, till it's full or the bottle runs out.
- Before you start your car, close the cap and look a second time that the diesel cap never came off.
Stop there if you find, at stage two or three, that you've already poured into the diesel side. Don't go on to stage five.
Kenton: already put AdBlue in the diesel tank?
Brief list, then. Top of that: your engine remains unstarted. Keep the ignition off too, because on many diesels it by itself runs your fuel pump. AdBlue doesn't mix with diesel — it sinks to the bottom of that tank, where your fuel is pulled from — so do not top up with diesel to thin it.
Ask the staff to help roll the car away from the petrol pump if you're on a forecourt — the JET, the BP or anywhere else. Leave it where it is if you are on your own driveway in Kenton.
Stop as soon as it is safe and switch off, if your motor has already run. On the M1, under 5 miles from Kenton, that means the next exit. Mileage matters — a short hop across Kenton makes a smaller job than heading under 10 miles towards Westminster — so tell us roughly how far it went.
Kenton: what happens when our technicians get there
Our van comes to the car wherever it has come to rest — your own driveway, beside Saint Mary-the-Virgin, or outside Elmgrove Primary School & Nursery. Both the work and our price depend on three replies — what liquid, which amount, and if it's run — so we ask. You hear that price on the phone, before anyone sets off.
The system is then purged thoroughly, after your tank is emptied. Not like petrol, AdBlue leaves crystals and eats at some fuel-system metals, and none of that washes away by itself. That is why it matters more. Filter cleaned or, if needed, replaced; fresh diesel in; then a check of the car. We do not go until it has been started and is running smoothly.
With pumps fine on a busy forecourt and quiet enough for use outside a house at night, most jobs in which your motor has not run need roughly half an hour after our engineers are there. Your insurer usually wants an engineer's report and your VAT invoice, and you get both at the end. Payment comes on the day, with no money upfront. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it's worth checking yours while we're on the way.
About Kenton and where it is
Kenton is a locality in northwest Greater London, situated near the River Brent and the Grand Union Canal. Kenton sits at an elevation of around 53 metres, approximately 9.6 miles from central London. Kenton is characterized by its semi-detached housing stock and is surrounded by nearby places such as Greenhill, North Wembley, and Preston.
AdBlue drains in Kenton and across Greater London
Kenton is a small village, and our teams that cover it also work the towns near it, North Wembley and Preston among them, across the HA postcode area. Quote a postcode that starts HA3 0, and our van arrives fastest.
There's no need to shift the vehicle. Wherever it stands — beside Library, on a layby en route to Kenton Recreation Ground, at home — that's where it is cleared. Tricky to explain, like the back of Kenton Sports Club? By a border? Checking is better than assuming, and so ring.
In short, for Kenton people
Before you pour, read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank regardless, leave it off and phone 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it stands, anywhere across Greater London.