Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Lothersdale
Engine off, ignition off: that's where you start if AdBlue has gone into your diesel tank. AdBlue is urea mixed in water. It does not burn, it doesn't mix with diesel, and the harm it does begins when the fuel system draws it in. In Lothersdale, AdBlue in a diesel tank caught before your motor runs normally means a drain and a thorough flush, right where the car is. Nothing comes before ringing 0333 366 0103.
What to do right now, Lothersdale: AdBlue in your diesel tank
Do:
- So no one can switch your ignition on, pull the keys out.
- Put the hazard lights on if you're at all close to moving traffic.
- So you can tell us which liquid it was and roughly what quantity, keep the receipt or the empty bottle.
- Ring just where you are. Say a BD20 8 postcode or the closest street name, and nobody has to hunt for you.
Never do these:
- Do not start the motor, even for a moment to shift the car.
- Do not switch the ignition on. On many diesels that alone runs the fuel pump.
- Don't top up with diesel to thin it. AdBlue doesn't mix in diesel; it separates out.
- Any driving at all is best avoided, even a short distance down Dale End.
- By the road, do not attempt draining it on your own.
Rolling the vehicle away from the pumps is a job for staff to help with, wherever Lothersdale forecourt you're on, the BP included. On the drive, your car remains just as it is.
What does AdBlue do in a diesel tank?
AdBlue is made for the exhaust, not the engine. Its own tank keeps it, and from there it's sprayed into your exhaust, where it cleans the fumes. Nothing inside a fuel pump is designed for this liquid — and none of it was intended to travel through one.
Fuel mixes; AdBlue, after tipped in, won't. The behaviour is not at all like fuel's. Heavier than diesel, it drops and collects below it — the same spot the intake sucks from. Simplest of all: a vehicle that got AdBlue in Stone Head last night and hasn't been started since. The AdBlue sits at the base of your tank, undrawn — though it will be first through once your engine runs, ahead of any diesel at all.
Two kinds of harm come from there. What remains once the water evaporates is urea, which forms crystals: they lodge in narrow passages and clog filters. On top of that, it eats at certain metals in the fuel system, and keeps going until it's cleared out. Overnight, a vehicle sitting around Lothersdale with AdBlue in its lines gets worse; where it is just in your tank, nothing changes. The water in it causes harm of its own: the high-pressure fuel pump and your injectors depend on diesel to lubricate them, and water offers them nothing.
Petrol or AdBlue in a diesel: why AdBlue is often worse
Put petrol in a diesel at the Asda and you have a fault of thin fuel. Damage only comes from driving on it. Mixed into your diesel and sitting inside that tank, it does none.
With AdBlue in a diesel, the liquid itself is simply the wrong one. It doesn't burn, and so it can't simply be run through. Nor can it be thinned, since it splits back out — and the following tankful will not rinse away deposits or corrosion. So the flush matters more with AdBlue, and trying the engine "to see", in the heart of Lothersdale or out in Lane Ends, costs more than almost any other slip.
With AdBlue, the good news is no separate from petrol. If your motor has not run, the AdBlue is still in that tank, and the tank is the quickest part of a fuel system to clear, wherever in North Yorkshire the vehicle is standing.
How AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank around Lothersdale
Plenty of motors place the AdBlue filler alongside the diesel cap, now and then behind one flap, and in dim light the two may look the same. No one intends it. Most of the time it happens with a bottle bought on the way home and poured in on the drive, not at the pump.
A few familiar ways account for the majority of them. Rushing, outside Lothersdale Primary School, after a warning lamp flashed on during the school run, a parent refills the vehicle. A bottle is poured in at the end of the day on a drive just off Calf Wood Lane. Else, in dim light outside Hare And Hounds Inn, the vehicle is topped up by a driver using that flap the first time.
The least known vehicles get it the most — rentals, new ones, company ones, and the other motor in a family with one of each fuels. Wherever around North Yorkshire, Lothersdale as well, the mistake doesn't change, and neither does the first step: keep it off.
Already started your engine with AdBlue in your diesel tank around Lothersdale?
In that case, the AdBlue is no longer in your tank. The fuel filter and pipework have had it sucked along, and some running time carries it on to the injection pump and every injector.
Perhaps returning from Mowhole Plantation, or part way across Lothersdale, your engine might go rough, smoke, lose pace, light up your dash or stall. No restarting to check: pull over when it is safe, then switch it off. More of that is pulled through with each start.
If you were on the M65, under 10 miles from Lothersdale, come off at the next junction and stop somewhere sensible instead of pressing on.
Mileage matters: every mile pushes the AdBlue deeper in, so heading towards Bradford, under 25 miles away, makes a far bigger job than hopping across Lothersdale to the car park by Lothersdale Village Hall. Roughly how far had it come? Tell us.
There is more to flush once the engine has been started, and our engineers do all of it where the car has ended up. Very seldom does it leave permanent damage if it's caught soon.
What clearing AdBlue from a diesel involves around Lothersdale
Anywhere it has stopped in Lothersdale — a forecourt, a layby, a driveway, a road by Christ Church, Lothersdale — our van comes to the vehicle. The work depends on three replies, which we get first — what was put in, the quantity, and if the engine has turned over.
Then that tank is emptied where the vehicle sits, and so the contaminated fuel and the AdBlue come out together. With AdBlue, more so than with petrol, flushing counts: the fuel system is flushed all the way through since what remains won't wash away unaided. The fuel filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; fresh diesel goes in; and your car is tested. If the motor hasn't run, most jobs take about half an hour once our technicians are there. Quiet enough for use outside a house at night, and fine on a busy forecourt, our pumps are explosion-proof.
The final step is to bleed the fuel system on new diesel. At that point our engineers fire it up and you set off, whether from a parking space by Cononley or a driveway around Lothersdale. The test before we head off is that it runs properly on clean diesel. The whole job is done where the car is, so it never has to go to a garage. Your insurer will want an engineer's report and your VAT invoice — each handed over afterwards.
About Lothersdale itself
Lothersdale is a village in North Yorkshire, situated on the riverside at an elevation of 192 metres, with detached housing being the predominant type of accommodation. Lothersdale lies near the villages of Raygill, Gill, and Middleton, and is approximately 15 miles from the city of Bradford. Lothersdale has a population of around 509 people and is located in a rural area, with the nearest major city being Bradford. Lothersdale is also relatively distant from London, at a distance of 184.7 miles.
AdBlue drains around Lothersdale and across North Yorkshire
Over the BD postcode area, the vans taking AdBlue jobs in Lothersdale serve much of North Yorkshire as well, Raygill, Gill and Middleton among them. Close to a boundary, or somewhere tricky to explain? Asking is better than guessing, so ring.
Anywhere your vehicle sits — your drive at home, a side street, a parking area, a filling station — our technicians drain it on the spot, and there's no need to bring it to us; that suits Lothersdale, a village, well.
What does AdBlue in a diesel tank cost to sort out in Lothersdale?
Each job differs, and so not one single quote would be honest. What moves the cost is, first, whether your engine has been running and for how long; then how much AdBlue went in; and finally where the vehicle is and whether our van can reach it safely, which is easier on an open drive than in a tight gap behind Carleton Cross.
For that in mind, each enquiry from Lothersdale opens by asking the same trio — which fluid went in, how much, if it ran — ahead of a figure. With those replies, a range narrows to a single firm figure.
Quoted on the call before the van sets out, it is paid for that day — card or phone, no deposit. Check your policy whilst we are on the way: plenty include misfuelling cover.
In Lothersdale and still next to your car?
Then, do nothing — that's the most helpful move available. Keys out, engine off, ignition off. Phone 0333 366 0103 then tell us it's AdBlue, about how much, and if it's run. Petrol in Diesel takes it from there, around Lothersdale or anywhere across North Yorkshire.