Kirkbampton: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Avoid It?
Keep your motor and ignition off then phone 0333 366 0103 now — the rest can wait when AdBlue is already in your diesel tank. A drain plus a full flush, carried out just where the car stands around Kirkbampton, is normally all it takes when found before the motor runs. The rest of this page explains why it takes place and how to make sure it does not — useful if you're reading before it has happened.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel motor
Not one liquid but two: that's what many newer diesels near Kirkbampton and Moorhouse carry, with diesel for the engine. AdBlue goes to the exhaust, where it is sprayed into the gas to clean it, and it lives in a tank of its own.
Each tank has its own filler. Under one flap, side by side: that is the layout on a lot of motors. Elsewhere, AdBlue's filler is beneath the bonnet or in your boot instead. Diesel goes in on every filling station visit, week in, week out. Far less frequently, the AdBlue side is filled — normally from a bottle, by a person thinking about where it goes. The error lives in that gap.
How AdBlue in the diesel tank occurs in Kirkbampton
Rarely is it carelessness: usually three things coincide.
First, the warning. Low AdBlue triggers a message from the car, and letting it run dry means limp mode — so a hurried top-up, maybe before work off Oak Lane, or outside the pub in the village on the way home that evening.
Then the car is new. A hire car, a new motor or a company car puts the fillers where your last one did not, and your hand hits for the cap it would have used on the old one.
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 once it has started. The same few seconds decide it, in the middle of Kirkbampton or out in Thurstonfield.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Before you tip anything, whether on a driveway in Longburgh or a forecourt in Kirkbampton, check these. They take a few seconds.
- The cap. The AdBlue cap is commonly blue, or marked "AdBlue". Your diesel cap normally is not. Read it instead of going by position.
- Many motors give AdBlue the smaller neck of the two.
- Look inside the fuel flap: plenty of vehicles carry a label there saying which fuel goes where.
- The handbook says where it is if the filler isn't next to the diesel cap: the boot, or under the bonnet.
- Check with the person who drove it last — before you leave, not when the light comes on — when you collect a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park outside Dalston (Cumbria).
Keeping AdBlue out of the diesel tank when you top up
For the day the warning appears — anywhere you are around Cumbria — a simple routine to follow.
- Pull in on level, engine off, with time in hand — never hurried on the side of Oaks Lane.
- Locate the AdBlue filler, read the cap, and say the word "AdBlue" aloud while you unscrew it. It sounds daft. It works.
- Leave your diesel cap on. If both sit under one flap, check your diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle.
- Slowly is best, through the bottle's own spout, till it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Only then, start the vehicle: close the cap, check a second time, and make sure your diesel cap was never opened.
Spot at step two or three that it has already gone into the diesel side? So stop right there. Never go on to stage five.
AdBlue in your diesel tank already, in Kirkbampton?
Don't start the motor: that is how the short order of things begins. On plenty of diesels your ignition alone runs the fuel pump, so do not switch the car on. Thinning it with extra diesel fails, because AdBlue settles to the bottom instead of blending — and that is where the fuel is sucked from.
If you're at a forecourt, whether it's the Esso or the Asda, ask the staff to help roll the car clear of the petrol pump. Your own drive in Kirkbampton is the place it should stay.
When the engine has been run already, stop safely then turn it off. On the M6, under 10 miles from Kirkbampton, that means the next junction. About how far did it go? Hopping across Kirkbampton is less a job than a trip of under 10 miles towards Carlisle, and so say.
Our arrival in Kirkbampton, and what occurs next
Anywhere the car has stopped, whether outside Kirkbampton CofE School, beside Kirkbampton Village Hall or on your own drive, our van comes to it. Our technicians ask what got in, roughly how much, and if it's run, because the answers determine the work and our quote. During the call itself, you are told our price — ahead of anything else.
Then your tank is cleared and your system rinsed thoroughly. Not like petrol, AdBlue leaves crystals and attacks certain fuel-system metals, and neither washes out unaided. That is why it counts more. The filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and the vehicle is tested. Next our technicians fire it up and make sure it runs smoothly before leaving.
If your engine has not run, most jobs take about half an hour once we are there, using pumps that are safe on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark. Your insurer will ask for an engineer's report and the VAT invoice, and both are yours once this job is done. Payment comes on the day, with no money upfront. Before we get there, take a look at your insurance documents; many include cover for misfuelling.
About Kirkbampton
Kirkbampton is a small village in Cumbria, situated near the coast at an elevation of 31 metres, with detached housing being the predominant type of accommodation. Kirkbampton lies close to the city of Carlisle, approximately 5.8 miles away, and is surrounded by nearby places such as Thurstonfield and Oughterby. Kirkbampton has a population of around 607 people and is located in the north-west of England, about 264 miles from London. Kirkbampton's setting near the coast and its proximity to Carlisle make it a unique village in the region.
AdBlue drains around Kirkbampton, and Cumbria beyond
Being a coastal village, Kirkbampton has the same vans as nearby places — Oughterby, Longrigg — right through CA postcodes and the wider area around them. Give a postcode beginning CA5 6, and the van arrives fastest.
The car remains put. Our engineers drain it where it is — a side street near St Peter, a lay-by on the way to Village Green, a drive. If you are near a boundary, or somewhere hard to explain like the back of Cumberland Bird Of Prey Centre, ring and ask rather than guessing.
For Kirkbampton people, the short version
Read the cap before you pour. Even so AdBlue in the diesel tank? Petrol in Diesel can empty it wherever it is, anywhere in Cumbria: switch the car off and call 0333 366 0103.