Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Kingshurst
If AdBlue has got into the diesel tank, leave the motor off and keep the ignition off. AdBlue is urea dissolved in water. Not like fuel, it neither burns nor mixes, and no harm happens until your motor pulls it through. If the engine hasn't run yet, AdBlue in a diesel tank is normally drained and carefully rinsed where the car sits around Kingshurst. No step comes before ringing 0333 366 0103.
AdBlue in your diesel tank in Kingshurst: the first few minutes
Do these:
- So no one can switch the ignition on, take your keys away.
- If you're anywhere near moving traffic, put the hazard lights on.
- So you can tell us which liquid it was and roughly what quantity, keep your receipt or the empty bottle.
- Call right where you are. Say a B36 0 postcode or the closest street sign, and no one has to search for you.
Don't:
- No starting the engine — not briefly, not to reposition the vehicle.
- Switching the key to ignition alone starts your pump going on plenty of diesels. Avoid it.
- Adding extra diesel doesn't help: AdBlue separates out rather than thinning.
- Any driving at all is best avoided, including a short distance up Chester Road.
- Do not try to drain the car yourself at the roadside.
The staff on duty at any Kingshurst filling station — the BP among them — will usually help rolling it aside if you ask. On your own driveway, don't move it at all.
AdBlue in a diesel tank, and what it does there
Meant for the exhaust, AdBlue has no business in the engine. It goes into its own tank and is sprayed into your exhaust gas to clean it. Nothing inside an injection pump is made for this liquid — and no part of that was meant to go that way.
Poured in with the diesel, it stays apart rather than mixing — quite different from fuel. The intake takes fuel from the lowest part of your tank, and that's exactly where AdBlue ends up: as it is denser than diesel, it sinks. Once your pump runs, the AdBlue is top of the list to be pulled through. Until then it sits beneath your diesel, and that is how a car filled in Castle Bromwich yesterday and never switched on stays the simple case, provided nobody turns your key.
From there it does two kinds of harm. 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 running on the parts it gets to for as long as it stays there. Where the AdBlue has reached the lines, leaving it overnight in Kingshurst leaves it worse. In the tank only, time costs nothing. The water in it causes harm of its own: the high-pressure fuel pump and the injectors depend on diesel to lubricate them, and water gives them nothing.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel frequently the bigger fault?
Put petrol in a diesel at the Esso and you have a problem of thin fuel. It mixes with your diesel, and while it is in your tank it causes no harm; the damage comes from running your engine on it.
With AdBlue in a diesel, the liquid itself is plainly the wrong one. It doesn't burn, so it cannot just be run through. Whether the vehicle is in Chelmsley Wood or the centre of Kingshurst, firing it up "to see" does more harm in this case than almost any other mistake, and the flush matters for more. Why: it won't remain mixed, and so watering it down is impossible; and deposits and corrosion survive the following fill.
As with petrol, there's good news. Emptying a tank is the easiest job on any fuel system, and with no running, the AdBlue remains in there — wherever across West Midlands your vehicle sits.
Kingshurst: how AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank
After dark, two caps together — the AdBlue one and the diesel cap, now and then under a single flap — can appear the same. Nobody means it; many layouts invite it. It usually takes place outside the house, from a container grabbed on the journey home, rather than at the forecourt.
It tends to take place in a couple of familiar ways. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up takes place in a hurry outside Kingshurst Primary School. A driver tips the container in outside their house, just off School Close, as the day ends. Another pattern: dim light, the car park by The Toby Jug, and someone opening that flap the first time.
Rented vehicles, brand-new cars, company cars, or the second car in a home with both fuels: the least known vehicles get it most. Leave it off: that is the first response to the same slip, anywhere around Kingshurst or the rest of West Midlands you are.
Already started the motor with AdBlue in the diesel tank in Kingshurst?
In that case, the AdBlue is no longer inside your tank. The filter and lines have had it pulled through, and any running carries it on to the injection pump and every injector.
Rough running, smoke from the exhaust, lost power, dashboard warnings or stalling: each might show up, maybe part way across Kingshurst or coming back from Smiths Wood. When safe, stop then turn it off — without restarting to see. Every start pulls more of that through.
On the M6, under a mile from Kingshurst, the first junction is where to leave, and somewhere sensible is where to stop — not carrying on.
How far it went matters. A few hundred yards across Kingshurst to the car park by Kingdom Hall of Jehovah's Witnesses is a very different job from a run towards Birmingham, under 10 miles away, with the AdBlue reaching further into the system with every mile. Let us know about how far it had come.
There's more to flush once the engine has run, and our engineers do all of it where the car has stopped. When it's caught early, lasting damage is very unusual.
What draining AdBlue from a diesel involves around Kingshurst
Our technicians come to the vehicle, wherever it has stopped around Kingshurst: a side street near St Barnabas' Church, a drive, a lay-by or a forecourt. Which fluid went in, about how much, plus whether your motor has turned over: our engineers check before all else, because those decide the work.
Then that tank is cleared where the vehicle stands, so the polluted fuel and the AdBlue come out together. The fuel system is flushed thoroughly, which matters more with AdBlue than with petrol, because what it leaves behind does not rinse out on its own. Fresh diesel goes in after your filter is cleaned — or replaced, if it needs to be — and then the vehicle is tested. If your engine hasn't run, the majority of jobs take about half an hour once we are there. Quiet enough to use outside a house at night, and safe on a busy forecourt, the pumps are explosion-proof.
Last, your system is bled with clean diesel. Whether it is a parking bay outside Water Orton or a driveway in Kingshurst, that is where we start it and you head off. It's checked on fresh diesel to confirm it runs smoothly before we go. Since the job is done in full where the vehicle is, a workshop never comes into it. Afterwards, you are given paperwork for your insurer: a VAT invoice plus a report from the engineer.
About Kingshurst
Kingshurst is a suburban area in the West Midlands, situated approximately 6.7 miles east of Birmingham. Kingshurst sits at an elevation of around 97 metres, in a region of low-lying hills and valleys. Kingshurst is characterised by its predominantly semi-detached housing stock, with nearby areas including Bacons End, Fordbridge, and Shard End. Kingshurst is home to a population of around 8170 people, making it a sizeable residential community.
AdBlue drains around Kingshurst and across West Midlands
AdBlue call-outs in Kingshurst are passed to vans that serve the places around it — Bacons End, Fordbridge plus Shard End — and much of West Midlands beyond, throughout B postcodes. If you're near a border, or somewhere hard to explain, ring and ask rather than assuming.
A van that comes to you fits Kingshurst, a residential suburb: you have no need to bring your car to us, since our technicians empty it on the spot, on a drive, a side street, a parking area or a forecourt.
What does AdBlue in a diesel tank cost to sort out around Kingshurst?
Each job differs, and so no fixed price is honest. Whether the motor has run, and for how long, comes first in what moves the price. How much AdBlue went in comes next, and then the position of the car, because an open drive is simpler for our van to get to safely than a tight space behind Kingshurst Library.
Which fluid went in, how much, plus if the engine ran: every Kingshurst enquiry begins by asking exactly that, before any figure, not afterwards. Those answers shrink a range down to one figure.
Quoted by phone before the van sets out, the job is paid for that day — card or phone, nothing in advance. Misfuelling cover comes with many insurance policies, so it pays to look at yours before the van gets there.
In Kingshurst and still next to the vehicle?
In that case, do nothing — that's the most helpful move available. Ignition off, engine off, keys out. Petrol in Diesel takes over the rest, in Kingshurst or anywhere in West Midlands, once you call 0333 366 0103 saying it's AdBlue, roughly how big an amount, and if the engine ran.