Avoiding AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Little Bookham: Why It Happens
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave the engine and the ignition off and phone 0333 366 0103. Caught before your engine runs, it's usually a drain and a thorough flush, done where the vehicle is in Little Bookham. If you are reading before it has happened, the remainder of this page is about why it happens and how to make sure it does not.
AdBlue in a diesel car: two tanks, two fillers
Plenty of current diesels on the roads round Little Bookham and Effingham carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to the motor. The exhaust, not your motor, is where AdBlue goes: dosed into the fumes to clean them, from its own tank.
Each tank has its own filler. Under one flap, side by side: that's the layout on a lot of cars. On others, AdBlue's filler sits beneath the bonnet or in the boot instead. Topping up your diesel side at the petrol pump happens constantly. Someone who has to stop and think where it goes usually tops up the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and much less commonly. The error lives in that gap.
Little Bookham: how AdBlue in your diesel tank happens
Three things tend to line up, and carelessness is seldom one of them.
Hurry comes from the warning. The car tells you as AdBlue runs low, and an empty tank sends it into limp mode — so the top-up gets done in a rush, before work on a driveway off Oakdene Road, or heading home in the car park at Windsor Castle.
The old car's filler is where your hand reaches — but a rental car, a new car or a company car puts the fillers elsewhere. That is the second thing: a strange motor.
Nothing stops the pour 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's a few seconds, be it in Great Bookham or bang in the heart of Little Bookham.
The AdBlue filler and the diesel filler: telling them apart
Look at these first, at a forecourt in Little Bookham or a drive out in Fetcham. A few seconds, no more.
- Where it sits misleads; the cap does not. AdBlue ones tend to be blue or carry the name "AdBlue" — diesel ones normally do not.
- The size. On many cars the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- Check inside your fuel flap: many cars have a label there saying which fuel goes where.
- In your boot or under the bonnet: that is where your filler is if it's 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 — if you pick up a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park outside Bookham.
How to top up without AdBlue in the diesel tank
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever around Surrey that is.
- Stop on level, motor off, with time to spare — not hurried on the side of Burnhams Road.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds daft and it does the trick.
- The diesel cap remains on. When the two sit under a flap, confirm it's closed before lifting the bottle.
- Slowly does it, through the bottle's own spout, till it's full or the bottle runs out.
- Only after that, start the vehicle: close the cap, check once more, and make sure your diesel cap was never opened.
Find at stage two or three that it has already gone into your diesel side? Then stop right there. Stage five is out.
Little Bookham: already put AdBlue in your diesel tank?
Do not start your engine: that is where the short order of things begins. The fuel pump starts on many diesels as soon as the ignition goes on — so leave it off. AdBlue does not mix with diesel — it sinks to the bottom of the tank, where your fuel is drawn from — so do not top up with diesel to dilute it.
Ask the staff to help roll your car clear of the pump if you are at a forecourt — the Esso, the BP or anywhere else. Leave it where it is if you are on your own drive in Little Bookham.
If your motor has already run, stop as soon as it is safe and switch off. Little Bookham lies under 3 miles from the M25; on it, use the next exit. About how far did it go? Hopping across Little Bookham is smaller work than a trip of under 25 miles to Westminster, so tell us.
Our arrival in Little Bookham, and what happens next
Outside Great Bookham School, close to St Nicolas or on your own drive: wherever the car has stopped, we come to it. The replies settle this work and the price, so our engineers ask what got in, roughly how much, and whether it's run. No one sets off before you've had our price over the phone.
Draining the tank comes next, then a thorough flush of the fuel system. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it doesn't wash out on its own — which is why the flush matters more here than with petrol. Once the filter has been flushed — or replaced, where needed — fresh diesel goes in, and then your car is tested. We don't leave until it has been fired up and is running smoothly.
Most jobs are done in about half an hour after our technicians get there, provided your motor hasn't run — and the pumps our technicians use are safe on a busy forecourt and quiet after dark outside a house. Nothing upfront; you settle up on the day. Afterwards, the VAT invoice and the report from the engineer go to you for your insurer. Wrong-fuel cover is part of plenty of insurance policies — and so use the wait to look at yours.
About Little Bookham
Little Bookham is a village in Surrey, situated inland at an elevation of 49 metres, and is located approximately 19 miles from London. Little Bookham has a population of around 1824 residents and is characterized by predominantly detached housing. Little Bookham is near the larger village of Great Bookham and is also close to Effingham Common, with the Isle of Wight being a more distant neighbouring location. Little Bookham remains a quiet residential community with a rural feel.
AdBlue drains around Little Bookham and across Surrey
Being a rural village, Little Bookham shares its vans nearby areas — Isle of Wight, Effingham Common — right across KT postcodes and the wider area around them. A postcode starting KT23 3 gets our van to you fastest.
No need to move your car. Draining takes place right there, be it a driveway, a street by Bookham Library, or a lay-by towards Oaken Wood. If you are near a border, or somewhere hard to explain like the back of All Saints Church, ring and ask rather than assuming.
The short version for Little Bookham drivers
Always, the cap; then, the tip. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it stands, anywhere in Surrey, if AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank regardless — and so leave it off then call 0333 366 0103.