Little Oxney Green: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Prevent It?
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave your motor and the ignition off and phone 0333 366 0103. Caught before your engine runs, it is normally a drain and a thorough flush, done where your car is in Little Oxney Green. The rest of this page explains why it takes place and how to ensure it does not — useful if you are reading before it has happened.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel motor
Many newer diesels around Newney Green, as well as Little Oxney Green, carry on two fluids; your engine gets just the diesel. Its own tank holds it, and from there it is sent to your exhaust, and there a spray treats the gas.
Separate tanks, different fillers. Other motors keep the AdBlue filler in the boot or under the bonnet; a lot more have both side by side under one flap. The diesel side is topped up at the petrol pump all the time. The AdBlue side is fuelled far less often, usually from a bottle, and usually by a person who has to stop and think where it goes. It is in the gap that the slip happens.
How AdBlue in the diesel tank occurs around Little Oxney Green
Carelessness rarely causes it. What does is three things coming up at once.
On a driveway off Highwood Road Roundabout before work, or in the car park at Rose & Crown on the way home: that is where the hurried top-up happens. Why the rush? As AdBlue runs low your car tells you, and if it is empty, limp mode follows.
Unfamiliar cars come second, too. Hire cars, new vehicles and company motors put their fillers in new places, and habit reaches for the cap used on the old one.
Nothing halts the tip after it has started, since a bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one. The bottle fits. The same few seconds settle it, in the middle of Little Oxney Green or out in Great Oxney Green.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Look at these first, at a forecourt in Little Oxney Green or a driveway out in Cooksmill Green. Seconds, no more.
- Blue and marking: an AdBlue cap is often blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap usually doesn't. Trust the cap, not its position.
- The size. On many cars the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- Lift the flap and check for a label — many vehicles show which belongs in each inlet just there.
- The handbook says which it lives when your filler is not 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 — if you pick up a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park at Chelmsford.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach your diesel tank
Wherever around Essex the light comes on, this is a routine for that day.
- Not in a rush on the side of Ongar Road, not on a slope, not with your engine running: park then switch off first.
- Locate the AdBlue filler, check the cap, and speak the word "AdBlue" aloud while unscrewing it. It sounds daft. It does the trick.
- The diesel cap stays on. When the two sit under a flap, make sure it's closed before the bottle comes up.
- Using the bottle's own spout, tip slowly — and stop when it is full or the bottle is empty.
- Close the cap, then check once more — making sure your diesel cap remained shut the whole time. After that, start the vehicle.
Stop there if you find, at stage two or three, that you've already poured into the diesel side. Stage five is out.
Already put AdBlue in the diesel tank in Little Oxney Green?
Then the order of things is short. Don't start the motor. The fuel pump runs on plenty of diesels the moment your ignition is switched on — so keep it off. AdBlue does not mix with diesel — it sinks to the bottom of your tank, where your fuel is drawn from — so don't top up with diesel to thin it.
If you are at a forecourt, whether it is the Harvest Energy or the BP, ask the attendants to help push the car away from the petrol pump. Your own driveway around Little Oxney Green is where it stays.
Already started? Stop when it's sensible, then turn off. Come off the M25 — under 15 miles out of Little Oxney Green — at the first junction. A short hop across Little Oxney Green is a smaller job than a run towards Chelmsford, under 3 miles away, and so tell us about how far it went.
Our arrival around Little Oxney Green, and what takes place next
Anywhere your car has stopped, be it by Writtle Junior School, beside Writtle Library or at home, the van travels to it. Our technicians ask what was put in, roughly how much, and if it has run, because the replies determine the work and the quote. You get that quote on the phone, before anybody heads out.
Your system is then cleaned thoroughly, once your tank is emptied. 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 that counts more with AdBlue than with petrol. The filter cleaned or, where needed, replaced; fresh diesel in; then a check of the vehicle. Before we leave, our technicians start the engine and confirm that it's running smoothly.
If the engine hasn't run, the majority of jobs take about half an hour once we're there, using pumps that are safe on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night. Nothing upfront; you settle up on the day. Afterwards, the VAT invoice and the report from the engineer go to you for the insurer. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it is worth checking yours while we are on the way.
About Little Oxney Green itself
Little Oxney Green is a suburban area located on the riverside in Essex, with an elevation of 57 metres. Little Oxney Green sits near the city of Chelmsford, approximately 2.9 miles away, and is also close to nearby places such as Great Oxney Green and Writtle. Little Oxney Green has a population of around 840 people and predominantly consists of semi-detached housing. Little Oxney Green is situated about 27.5 miles from London, making it a commuter-friendly location.
AdBlue drains around Little Oxney Green and across Essex
Little Oxney Green is a residential suburb, and the vans that cover it also work the towns around it, Writtle and Edney Common among them, across the CM postcode area. Quote a postcode beginning CM1 3, and the van arrives quickest.
Your car stays put. A drive, a lay-by on the way to Lee Wood, a side street close to Writtle United Reformed Church: our engineers drain the car where it stands. Guessing doesn't help behind All Saint's Church, close to a boundary, or anywhere hard to describe; ring and ask.
For Little Oxney Green drivers, the short version
Before you pour, read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank anyway, leave it off then phone 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel empties it where it stands, anywhere across Essex.