Preventing AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Lower Higham: Why It Happens
AdBlue already in the diesel tank? In that case put this page aside a moment, keep the ignition and engine off, and ring 0333 366 0103. Caught before your engine runs, it is usually a drain and a thorough flush, done where your car is around Lower Higham. The remainder of this page explains why it occurs and how to ensure it does not — useful if you are reading before it has happened.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel motor need its own filler?
Not one fluid but two: that is how many newer diesels around Lower Higham and Gadshill carry, with diesel for the motor. Stored in a tank of its own, AdBlue is sprayed into the exhaust gas to clean it.
There's a filler on every tank. Under one flap, next to each other: that is the arrangement on a lot of cars. On others, AdBlue's filler is under the bonnet or in your boot instead. Filling your diesel side at the petrol pump goes on constantly. Rarely topped up, AdBlue normally comes out of a bottle, tipped by someone who must stop and think what filler it needs. The mistake grows in that gap between the two.
Lower Higham: how AdBlue in your diesel tank occurs
It is seldom carelessness. Three things tend to line up.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low the car tells you, and if it runs out altogether, the car drops into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a driveway off Chequers Street before work, or in the car park outside Gardeners Arms on the way home.
Then your car is strange. A hire car, a new car or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't, and the hand hits for the cap it would have used on the old one.
And the bottle fits. A bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one, so nothing stops the pour after it has started. Whether it occurs in Church Street or the middle of Lower Higham, it's the same few seconds.
Which filler is for AdBlue, and which for diesel?
Check these first, on a forecourt in Lower Higham or a drive out in Cliffe Woods. A few seconds, that's all.
- Blue and lettering: an AdBlue cap is often blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap normally doesn't. Go by the cap, not where it sits.
- The size. On many cars the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- The flap. Look inside the fuel flap for a label. Many cars say there which fuel goes where.
- The handbook. If the filler isn't by the diesel cap, it is in the boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- The previous driver will know. Ask when you collect a hire car or fleet car — at Higham's car park, say — rather than once the light appears.
Keeping AdBlue out of the diesel tank when you top up
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever around Kent that is.
- Park then switch off. Not on a slope, not with your motor running, and not in a rush on the side of Lower Rochester Road.
- Find the AdBlue filler, check the cap, and say the name "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It seems silly. It does the trick.
- If both sit under one flap, check your diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — then leave it on.
- Tip slowly, using the bottle's own spout. Stop when it's full or when the bottle is empty.
- Only after that, start your car: close the cap, check a second time, and make sure your diesel cap was never opened.
If at step two or three you find you have already poured into the diesel side, stop there. Do not go on to step five.
Lower Higham: already put AdBlue in the diesel tank?
Do not start your engine: that is how the short order of things starts. Do not switch the ignition on; on plenty of diesels that alone runs the fuel pump. AdBlue does not mix with diesel — it sinks to the bottom of that tank, where the fuel is pulled from — so don't top up with diesel to thin it.
Ask the attendants to help push your car clear of the petrol pump if you are at a forecourt — the Esso, the Asda Express or anywhere else. Leave it where it is if you are on your own drive in Lower Higham.
If the motor has already run, stop as soon as it is safe then switch off. Lower Higham lies under 3 miles from the M2; there, use the first exit. About how far did it go? Hopping across Lower Higham is less a job than a run of under 15 miles towards Southend-on-Sea, and so say.
Our arrival in Lower Higham, and what occurs next
Our engineers come to the vehicle wherever it has stopped, whether that's outside Higham Primary School, near St Mary's or on your own drive. The replies decide this work and the price, so we ask what was put in, about how much, and whether it's run. On the call itself, you are told the quote — before anything else.
The fuel system is then purged thoroughly, once the tank is drained. With AdBlue that counts more than with petrol: it crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, and so it doesn't wash out on its own. Your filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and the car is tested. The motor is fired up next and checked to be sure it runs smoothly, all before our engineers head off.
If your engine has not run, the majority of jobs take about half an hour once we are there, using pumps that are safe on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark. You pay on the day, with nothing upfront, and get a VAT invoice and an engineer report for your insurer. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it is worth checking yours while we are on the way.
About Lower Higham, for a moment
Lower Higham is a small village in north Kent, situated near the Thames estuary at an elevation of around 11 metres. Lower Higham lies within commuting distance of London, approximately 26 miles to the west, and is close to the nearby city of Southend-on-Sea. Lower Higham has a mix of housing types, with semi-detached homes being predominant in the village.
AdBlue drains around Lower Higham, and Kent beyond
Higham and Mockbeggar are among the towns around Lower Higham, a coastal village, that the same vans cover, throughout ME postcodes. Quote a postcode that starts ME3 7, and the van arrives quickest.
There's no need to move your car. The drain happens on the spot, be it a driveway, a street near St. John's Church, or a lay-by towards Higham & Mockbeggar Cricket Club. Awkward to pin down, like the back of Abbey? By a county line? Checking beats guessing, so phone.
For Lower Higham drivers, the short version
Always, the cap; after that, the pour. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank anyway, leave the car off then phone 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel clears it where it sits, anywhere across Kent.