AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Ley Hill: How It Happens and How to Stop It
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave the motor and the ignition off and ring 0333 366 0103. A drain plus a full flush, carried out right where the car sits around Ley Hill, is usually what it needs when caught before your engine runs. If you're reading before it has happened, the rest of this page is about why it takes place and how to make sure it does not.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel vehicle
Plenty of current diesels on the roads round Ley Hill and Doe Bank carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to the engine. AdBlue goes to your exhaust, where it is sprayed into the gas to clean it, and it lives in a tank of its own.
Every tank has one filler of its own. On a lot of cars the two sit side by side under the same flap; on others the AdBlue filler is in your boot or under the bonnet. The diesel side is topped up at the petrol pump all the time. The AdBlue side is filled far less often, normally from a bottle, and usually by someone who has to stop and think where it goes. The slip lives in that gap.
How AdBlue in your diesel tank takes place around Ley Hill
Seldom is it carelessness: normally three things coincide.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low your car tells you, and if it runs out altogether, your vehicle drops into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a drive off Hawkesford Close before work, or in the car park outside The Green House on the way home.
Then the vehicle is strange. A hire car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't, and your hand reaches for the cap it would have used on the old one.
Nothing stops the tip once it has started, since a bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one. The bottle fits. It takes a few seconds, whether in Mere Green or bang in the centre of Ley Hill.
The AdBlue filler and your diesel filler: telling them apart
A couple of seconds is all these take — so run through them before you tip anything, on a driveway in Four Oaks Park or a forecourt around Ley Hill.
- Blue and marking: an AdBlue cap is frequently blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap usually does not. Trust the cap, not where it sits.
- Look at the size: the smaller neck is, on many cars, the AdBlue one.
- A label inside the fuel flap often says which fuel goes where, on many cars. Check for it.
- In the boot or under the bonnet: that's where your filler is if it is not by the diesel cap, and the handbook says which.
- Check with the person who drove it last — before you leave, not when the light comes on — when you pick up a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park at Four Oaks.
How to top up without AdBlue in the diesel tank
The day the light comes on, wherever across West Midlands, follow this routine.
- Park then switch off. Not on a slope, not with the motor running, and not in a rush on the side of Irnham Road.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, once you find the AdBlue filler and read it. Daft, yes, but it works.
- Both behind a single flap? So confirm the cap on the diesel side stays closed ahead of raising the bottle.
- Stop when the tank is topped up or the bottle is empty; before that, tip gently through its own spout.
- Only then, start the vehicle: close the cap, check again, and make sure the diesel cap was never opened.
Find at the second or third stage that AdBlue went into the wrong filler? That's where you stop. Leave out stage five altogether.
Already put AdBlue in the diesel tank in Ley Hill?
Then the order of things is short. Do not start your motor. Leave your ignition off as well, because on many diesels switching it on by itself starts your fuel pump. Diluting it with extra diesel won't work, because AdBlue settles to the bottom instead of blending — and that's where your fuel is sucked from.
Ask the staff to help roll your car clear of the petrol pump if you're at a forecourt — the Shell, the Esso or somewhere else. If you're on your own driveway in Ley Hill, leave the vehicle where it stands.
Stop as soon as it is safe then switch off, if your motor has already run. The next junction means where to come off if you are on the M6 Toll, under 3 miles from Ley Hill. Roughly how far did it go? Crossing Ley Hill is smaller a job than a run of under 10 miles towards Lichfield, and so tell us.
What occurs when our engineers get there around Ley Hill
Our van reaches the vehicle wherever it has come to rest — your own driveway, near Four Oaks Methodist Church, or outside Coppice Primary School. Our engineers ask what was put in, roughly how much, and if it has run, since those replies decide this work and the price. No one sets off before you've had the price over the phone.
The fuel system is then flushed thoroughly, after your tank is drained. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, and so it does not wash out on its own — which is why the flush matters more with AdBlue than with petrol. Once the filter has been cleaned — or renewed, if required — clean diesel is added, and then your vehicle gets tested. Before we go, our technicians fire it up and confirm that it is running properly.
Most jobs are finished in about half an hour once our engineers get there, provided the engine hasn't run — and the pumps we use are safe on a live forecourt yet quiet after dark beside a house. You pay on the day, with nothing upfront, and get a VAT invoice and an engineer report for your insurer. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it's worth checking yours whilst we're on the way.
About Ley Hill and where it is
Ley Hill is a suburban area in the West Midlands, situated approximately 7 miles from Lichfield and 103.7 miles northwest of London. Ley Hill sits at an elevation of around 155 metres, characterised by its predominantly detached housing stock. Ley Hill is located near other local places such as Mere Green, Moor Hall, and Ladywood, and has a population of around 3975 residents.
AdBlue drains in Ley Hill and across West Midlands
Being a residential suburb, Ley Hill has the same vans as nearby places — Moor Hall, Ladywood — all the way through B postcodes and the wider area around them. Give a postcode beginning B74 2, and the van gets there fastest.
The car remains where it is. Wherever it stands — near Mere Green Library, in a layby heading to Moor Hall Golf Course, at home — that is where it is drained. Ring and ask rather than guessing if you are close to a border, or somewhere hard to describe, like the back of All Saints Church.
The short version for Ley Hill people
Before you tip, read the cap. AdBlue in your diesel tank after all? Leave the car switched off and phone 0333 366 0103; Petrol in Diesel empties it on the spot, throughout West Midlands.