Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Loudwater
If AdBlue has got into your diesel tank, keep the motor off and keep your ignition off. Chemically, AdBlue is just urea in water. As it is water-based, it won't ignite and won't blend with diesel; trouble only starts when the pump begins pulling it. In Loudwater, AdBlue in a diesel tank found before the engine runs usually means a drain and a thorough flush, just where the car is. Before you do anything else, ring 0333 366 0103.
Loudwater, AdBlue in the diesel tank: what to do at once
Do these:
- So no one can turn the ignition on, pull your keys away.
- Hazards on, if moving traffic is at all close.
- So you can give us which fluid it was and about how much, keep your receipt or the empty bottle.
- Ring us from where you are. A postcode starting WD3 4, or the name of the closest street, brings our van to you without a search.
Do not do these:
- Shifting the car just a short way is no reason to start your engine.
- Don't switch the ignition on. On many diesels that alone runs the fuel pump.
- AdBlue doesn't mix in diesel — it separates out — so adding extra diesel won't thin it.
- Don't drive the vehicle anywhere, not even a short way down Sarratt Lane.
- Emptying the tank yourself by the road isn't worth trying.
Moving your vehicle off the pumps is a job for attendants to help with, whichever Loudwater forecourt you're on, the Shell included. At your own driveway, do not move it at all.
What AdBlue does in a diesel tank
AdBlue is made for the exhaust, not the engine. From a dedicated tank it goes directly to your exhaust, cleaning what the engine lets out. Nothing in it is meant to pass through a fuel pump, and nothing in a fuel pump is designed to handle it.
Inside a diesel tank it acts really differently from fuel. It does not mix in. It is heavier than diesel, and so it sinks and gathers at the bottom of your tank, which is where the pickup sucks fuel from. Simplest of all: a vehicle that had AdBlue in Croxley Green overnight and has not been started since. The AdBlue waits at the foot of the tank, undrawn — but it would be first through if your motor runs, ahead of any diesel at all.
From there it causes two kinds of damage. As its water goes, the urea left behind crystallises, and the crystals block filters and settle in fine passages. And it is corrosive to some of the metals a fuel system is made from, and so it keeps labouring on the components it hits for as long as it stays there. If the AdBlue has reached the pipework, waiting overnight in Loudwater leaves things worse. In that tank alone, time does nothing. The water in it causes harm of its own: the high-pressure pump and the fuel injectors depend on diesel to lubricate them, and water gives them nothing.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel commonly the bigger fault?
An issue of thinned fuel is what you get after filling a diesel with petrol from the Esso. It mixes with your diesel, and whilst it is in the tank it causes no harm; the harm comes from running your motor on it.
AdBlue in a diesel is an issue of the wrong substance altogether. It doesn't burn, and so it cannot simply be run through. Whether the car is in Church End or the centre of Loudwater, turning it over "to see" costs more in this case than almost any other error, and the flush matters for more. The reasons: it won't remain mixed, so watering it down fails; and deposits and corrosion survive the next tankful.
With AdBlue, the good news is no different from petrol. Not started? Then the AdBlue sits just in your tank, the easiest section of the whole system to clear, wherever the vehicle has stopped around Hertfordshire.
AdBlue in a diesel tank around Loudwater: how it ends up there
No one means to do it. The AdBlue filler on plenty of vehicles rests right next to the diesel filler, sometimes under the same flap, and the two caps can look alike in poor light. A container bought when heading home and poured in at home, instead of at the filling station, is the typical story.
It tends to occur in a couple of familiar ways. Hurrying, outside Rickmansworth Park Junior Mixed and Infant School, after a warning light came on during the school run, a parent tops up your car. Near Bridle Lane, someone pours a bottle in at home after work. Or someone new to that flap tops up the vehicle after dark, stopped in the car park by Coach and Horses.
The least known vehicles see it most — rentals, brand-new cars, company ones, and the other vehicle in a family with one of each fuels. Anywhere around Hertfordshire, Loudwater as well, the mistake doesn't change, and nor does the first step: keep it switched off.
AdBlue in the diesel tank around Loudwater, and your engine started?
Then that tank is no longer where the AdBlue is. Via your filter, along the pipework, and — given any running — into the injection pump and each injector: that's where it has gone.
Maybe returning from Upper Plantation, or midway across Loudwater, your motor may go rough, smoke, drop pace, light up the dash or stall. Once safe, pull over and switch it off — with no turning it on again to see. With each start, more of that is pulled through.
Loudwater sits under a mile from the M25; if you were on it, leave by the next junction and pull up safely instead of carrying on.
Each mile pushes the AdBlue deeper into the system. That's why crossing Loudwater to park near All Saints Parish Church and a drive of under 10 miles for St Albans are very distinct jobs. Roughly how far it had come is worth telling us.
We do all of the rinsing where the car has stopped, and once the engine has run there is more of it. Lasting damage is very uncommon when it's caught quickly.
What draining AdBlue from a diesel involves around Loudwater
Our engineers come to the car, wherever it has stopped in Loudwater: a side street near The Junction, a drive, a lay-by or a forecourt. Three answers shape the job, and so first we ask what was put in, roughly the amount, and whether the engine has run.
Then that tank is emptied where your car stands, 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 right through because residue will not flush out by itself. Testing your car follows at the end, once clean diesel goes in and the filter gets cleaned or, where needed, swapped. Roughly half an hour on site is usual for most jobs where your motor hasn't run. Our equipment is explosion-proof, so a live forecourt is no fault, and it's hushed enough for a residential street after dark.
New diesel goes in to bleed the fuel system, and that is the final step. You set off as soon as our engineers have fired it up, and it makes no difference whether the car is on a driveway in Loudwater or in a space by Rickmansworth. Our engineers make sure it runs correctly on fresh diesel before we leave. Because the job is done in full where the vehicle is, a garage never comes into it. The insurer is likely to want an engineer's report and the VAT invoice — each handed over afterwards.
About Loudwater itself
Loudwater is a small suburban area in Hertfordshire, situated on the riverside at an elevation of 86 metres. Loudwater lies approximately 18 miles from London and 9 miles from St Albans, with nearby places including Chandlers Cross, Rickmansworth, and Micklefield Green. Loudwater is characterised by its predominantly detached housing stock, reflecting its relatively affluent demographic. Loudwater has a population of around 730 residents, making it a small but distinct community within the wider region.
Loudwater and Hertfordshire: AdBlue drains across the area
AdBlue call-outs around Loudwater go to teams that serve the places around it — Chandlers Cross, Rickmansworth as well as Micklefield Green — and much of Hertfordshire beyond, across WD postcodes. Close to a border, or anywhere tricky to explain? Asking beats guessing, and so phone.
Loudwater is a residential suburb, and an on-site drain suits it: whether your car is on a home drive, a residential street, a car park or a forecourt, we drain it where it sits, so it never needs to be moved to us.
AdBlue in a diesel tank in Loudwater: the cost of fixing it
Not one single price could be fair, because each job differs. What changes the cost is, first, whether the motor has run and for how long; then how much AdBlue went in; and after that where the vehicle is and whether a technician can reach it safely, which is simpler on an open driveway than in a tight spot behind Rickmansworth Lawn Tennis Club.
Ahead of any quote, never after, each call from Loudwater opens with the same three checks: the liquid, the quantity, plus whether the engine ran. With those replies, the range shrinks to one fixed number.
Priced by phone before the van sets out, it is paid for that day — card or phone, no deposit. Look at your policy while we are on the way: plenty carry misfuelling cover.
Still next to the car in Loudwater?
Leaving your vehicle alone is, right now, the most useful thing you can do. Keys out, engine off, ignition off. Phone 0333 366 0103 then tell us it is AdBlue, roughly how much, and if it has run. Petrol in Diesel takes it from there, in Loudwater or anywhere in Hertfordshire.