Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Longside
If AdBlue has got into the diesel tank, leave the motor off and leave your ignition off. Water with urea mixed in it: that is AdBlue. Unlike fuel, it neither ignites nor mixes, and no harm happens until the motor sucks it through. In Longside, AdBlue in a diesel tank caught before your engine runs usually means a drain and a thorough flush, right where the vehicle is. Ring 0333 366 0103 before you do anything else.
Those opening minutes: AdBlue in the diesel tank in Longside
Do:
- Take your keys out, so nobody switches the ignition on.
- Put the hazards on if you're anywhere close to moving traffic.
- So you can give us which fluid it was and roughly how much, save your receipt or the empty bottle.
- Tell us a postcode starting AB42 4, or whichever street is nearest, and the van reaches you straight — so call from wherever you stand.
Things not to do:
- Shifting the vehicle just a short way is no reason to fire up the motor.
- Don't switch your ignition on. On many diesels that alone runs the fuel pump.
- Pouring in more diesel does not work: AdBlue settles out instead of blending.
- Never drive the vehicle anywhere, not even a short way up Inn Brae.
- No emptying it yourself, at all, on the roadside.
The attendants on duty at any Longside forecourt — the Esso included — will normally lend a hand pushing it clear if you ask. If you are on your own drive, leave the vehicle exactly where it is.
AdBlue in a diesel tank: what it does
Meant for the exhaust, AdBlue has no place in your engine. Kept in a dedicated tank, it is squirted into the exhaust to treat the fumes. Neither side suits the other: urea does not belong in an injection pump, and a pump can't take urea.
Inside a diesel tank it behaves really differently from fuel. It does not mix in. Heavier than diesel, it sinks and collects below it — the very spot the pickup sucks from. Once the system runs, the AdBlue is top of the list to be pulled through. Until then it sits beneath the diesel, which is why a car filled in Nether Kinmundy yesterday and never started stays the simple one, provided nobody touches the key.
It causes two kinds of damage from there. It attacks certain metals used in fuel components, working on any part it reaches till it is cleared from your system. And when the water evaporates, the urea turns into crystals that block filters and settle in tiny passages. A motor left sitting in Longside with AdBlue already in its lines is worse by the morning; one with AdBlue just in its tank is not. The water in it does damage of its own: your high-pressure pump and your injectors depend on diesel to lubricate them, and water gives them nothing.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel often the bigger issue?
Fill a diesel with petrol in error at the Asda, and the problem is diluted fuel. It mixes with the diesel, and whilst it is inside the tank it causes no harm; the damage comes from running your engine on it.
AdBlue in a diesel is another problem: not thin fuel, yet no fuel at all. Not burning, it cannot simply be run through. It does not stay mixed, so it cannot be thinned. And crystals and corrosion don't wash out with the next tank of fuel. That's why the flush counts more with AdBlue than with petrol, and why starting the engine "to see" costs more here than almost anywhere else, whether the car is in Mintlaw or the middle of Longside.
The same good news holds as with petrol. If your motor hasn't run, the AdBlue is still in your tank, and your tank is the quickest part of a fuel system to clear, wherever around Aberdeenshire your car is sitting.
How AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank around Longside
Nobody means to do it. The AdBlue filler on many vehicles sits right next to your diesel filler, at times under the same flap, and the two caps can look alike in poor light. Mostly it is not the forecourt: someone buys a container driving home and pours it in outside the house.
A couple of familiar ways account for the majority of them. Rushing, outside the local primary school, after a warning light came on during the school run, someone refills the vehicle. Near Winding Brae, someone tips a bottle in on that drive in the evening. Another pattern: darkness, the car park outside the pub in the village, and a driver opening that flap for the first time.
The least familiar vehicles see it most — rentals, new ones, company cars, and the spare car in a home with both fuel types. Wherever across Aberdeenshire, Longside as well, the mistake does not change, and neither does the first step: leave it off.
AdBlue in the diesel tank around Longside, and your engine started?
In that case, the AdBlue is no longer in that tank. It has been pulled through the filter and the lines, and if your motor ran for any time, it has got to the high-pressure pump and the injectors.
Perhaps coming back from Davidson Park, or part way across Longside, the motor may run lumpy, smoke, lose pace, light up the dash or cut out. Stop as soon as it is safe, switch off, and do not restart the vehicle to check. More of it is pulled through with each start.
On the M90, over 50 miles from Longside, the first junction is where to leave, and anywhere sensible is where to stop — not driving on.
Mileage matters: every mile pushes the AdBlue further into the system, so driving for Aberdeen, under 50 miles away, makes a far bigger job than crossing Longside to the car park by Longside Parish Church. Approximately how far had it come? Tell us.
Once your engine has run, the flush takes in more, and all of it is done where the vehicle has stopped. Permanent damage is very unusual if it is caught early.
What does an AdBlue drain on a diesel involve in Longside?
We come to your car, wherever it has stopped around Longside: a side street near War Memorial, a drive, a lay-by or a forecourt. What was put in, about how much, and whether your engine has been run: we ask first, since those decide the work.
Next, emptying that tank right there takes out the contaminated diesel and the AdBlue in one go. What remains from AdBlue won't flush away unaided, and so the fuel system gets a careful flush, which counts far more with urea than for petrol. After that, your filter: flushed, or changed when it must be. Then fresh diesel, then a test of the car. The majority of these jobs are a half-hour job once our technicians get there, provided your engine hasn't run. Low-noise enough for use outside a house at night, and fine on a working forecourt, our pumps are explosion-proof.
Lastly, the fuel system is bled with clean diesel. You head off as soon as we have fired it up, and it makes no difference whether the car is on a drive in Longside or in a bay by the nearest station. Before we go, we check it's running properly with fresh diesel in. Since the job is done in its entirety where your car is, a workshop never comes into it. The insurer will want an engineer's report and your VAT invoice — each handed over once the job is done.
About Longside, for a moment
Longside is a village in Aberdeenshire, situated on the riverside at an elevation of 27 metres, with detached housing being the predominant type of accommodation. Longside lies near the villages of Flushing, Cuttyhill, and Toddlehills, and is approximately 26 miles from Aberdeen. Longside has a population of around 813 residents, who enjoy the scenic views of the surrounding countryside. Longside is also relatively distant from major cities like London, being around 421 miles away.
AdBlue drains across Longside and Aberdeenshire
Over the AB postcode area, the vans answering AdBlue jobs in Longside reach much of Aberdeenshire as well, Flushing, Cuttyhill and Toddlehills included. Ring and ask instead of guessing if you are close to a border, or anywhere tricky to explain.
No towing is needed. In Longside, a village, a mobile service works: your car is drained on the spot, be it in a driveway, a residential street, a parking area or a filling station.
What AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to put right in Longside
Not one single figure would be honest, since every job is different. What moves the cost is, first of all, whether the motor has run and for how long; then how much AdBlue got in; and after that where your car is and whether a technician can reach it safely, which is easier on an open drive than in a tight spot behind Saint John's Church.
That is why each call from Longside starts with the same three questions, asked before giving a figure, not after: what was put in, how much, and whether it has run. Those replies narrow the range right down to a single figure.
You get that price on the phone, before anyone sets off, and you pay on the day, by card or by phone, with nothing upfront. Misfuelling cover comes with many insurance policies, so it is worth looking at yours before the van gets there.
Longside: still next to your car?
Then, the most helpful thing to do with your vehicle is to not touch it. Keys out; engine and ignition off. Tell us it's AdBlue, about what quantity, and if it ran, on 0333 366 0103. After that Petrol in Diesel handles it, in Longside or wherever in Aberdeenshire.