AdBlue in the Diesel Tank in Merrington Lane? Keep It Switched Off
Engine off, ignition off: that is how you begin if AdBlue has gone into your diesel tank. AdBlue is urea dissolved in water. Not like fuel, it neither ignites nor blends, and no harm starts till your motor sucks it round. If the engine hasn't run yet, AdBlue in a diesel tank is usually emptied and thoroughly cleaned where the car sits around Merrington Lane. Before you do anything else, ring 0333 366 0103.
Your next steps straight away, Merrington Lane: AdBlue in the diesel tank
Do:
- So no one can turn your ignition on, take the keys out.
- Hazards on, if moving traffic is anywhere close.
- The empty bottle or the receipt tells us the fluid and the amount, and so do not bin it away.
- Ring us from where you are. A postcode starting DL16 7, or the name of the nearest street, gets the van to you without a search.
Do not:
- No starting the motor — not briefly, not to shift the vehicle.
- Many diesels run their fuel pump the instant your ignition comes on, and so keep the vehicle off.
- AdBlue doesn't mix in diesel — it separates out — so adding extra fuel won't weaken it.
- Never drive it anywhere, not even a short stretch down Cornish Park Road.
- Don't try to drain it yourself by the kerbside.
On a forecourt around Merrington Lane, whether it's the Asda or another one, ask the attendants to help you roll your car away from the petrol pump. Stopped on your own drive? Then it remains exactly where it is.
What does AdBlue do in a diesel tank?
AdBlue is made for your exhaust, not your engine. Stored in a separate tank, it's injected into the exhaust stream to treat the gases. No part in a fuel pump is made for this liquid — and no part of it was intended to go that way.
Fuel blends; AdBlue, after tipped in, won't. Its behaviour is nothing like diesel's. It drops, because it's heavier than diesel, and pools down where the pickup takes its fuel from. Easiest of all: one that got AdBlue in Mount Pleasant last night and has not been started since. The liquid waits at the foot of your tank, undrawn — but it will be first through once your motor runs, ahead of any diesel at all.
Once it is drawn in, the damage takes two forms. What is left when the water goes is urea, which forms crystals: they lodge in tiny channels and clog filters. Worse, it eats at some metals in a fuel system, and carries on till it's flushed out. By daybreak, a car sitting in Merrington Lane with AdBlue through its pipework gets worse; where it is only inside the tank, nothing changes. The water in it does harm of its own: your high-pressure pump and the fuel injectors rely on diesel to lubricate them, and water offers them nothing.
AdBlue in a diesel: why it's regularly worse than petrol
Put petrol in a diesel at the BP and you have a problem of thin fuel. It mixes with the diesel, and while it's in the tank it does no damage; the damage comes from running your engine on it.
With AdBlue in a diesel, the liquid itself is simply the wrong one. Not burning, it cannot just be run through. Whether the car is in Tudhoe Grange or the heart of Merrington Lane, firing it up "to see" costs more with AdBlue than almost any other mistake, and the flush matters for more. Why: it won't remain mixed, so diluting it fails; and crystals and corrosion survive the next fill.
As with petrol, there's good news. Clearing a tank is the simplest part on a fuel system, and with no running, the AdBlue remains in it — wherever in Durham your car sits.
AdBlue in a diesel tank around Merrington Lane: how it ends up there
It's not deliberate. Many vehicles have the AdBlue inlet alongside the diesel one, now and then behind a single flap, and muddling them up is simple in poor light. A bottle bought when driving home and poured in outside the house, instead of at the filling station, is the typical route.
The ways it happens are few and familiar. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up takes place in a hurry outside North Park Primary School. Near B6288, someone tips a container in on that drive in the evening. Else, after dark outside The Winning Post, the car gets refilled by a driver opening that flap the first time.
It comes up most in a hire car, a brand-new car, a fleet motor, or the other car of a home with one of each fuel types — the cars drivers know the least. Leave it off: that's the first response to the same mistake, anywhere in Merrington Lane or the rest of Durham you are.
Merrington Lane: started the engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank?
Then the AdBlue has left that tank. Given any running, it travels to the injection pump and each injector, having passed through the filter and lines.
Rough running, smoke from the exhaust, lost power, dashboard lights or stalling: any may show up, perhaps midway across Merrington Lane or returning from Bessemer Community Park. Stop as soon as it is safe, switch off, and do not restart the car to check. More of that is pulled through with each start.
Merrington Lane sits under 5 miles from the A1(M); if you were on it, leave at the first junction and pull up somewhere safe rather than driving on.
A quick hop across Merrington Lane to the car park by Jubilee Independent Methodist Church is one matter; heading towards Durham, under 10 miles away, is another, since each mile pushes the AdBlue further in. So mileage counts. Tell us about how far it had come.
Wherever the vehicle came to a stop is where all of it gets done, even with more to clean out after your engine has been started. Permanent damage is very rare if it is spotted early.
What emptying AdBlue from a diesel involves around Merrington Lane
Wherever it has come to rest in Merrington Lane — a filling station, a layby, a driveway, a street by Spennymoor Library And Leisure Centre — the van travels to the car. Before anything else we ask what got in, about how much, and whether the motor has been run, since those answers settle this work.
Next, draining that tank right there removes the polluted diesel and the AdBlue in one go. A careful flush counts far more with AdBlue than after petrol, because what remains will not clear out on its own. The fuel filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and the car is tested. Not run? Then expect roughly half an hour once we are there for most jobs. Our equipment is explosion-proof, so a busy forecourt is no issue, and it's hushed enough for a residential street after dark.
Bleeding your system with fresh diesel comes last. At that point we fire it up and you head off, whether from a parking bay at Bishop Auckland or a drive around Merrington Lane. Our engineers make sure it runs properly on fresh diesel before leaving. No workshop is required at any point, with the whole job done on the spot. Insurers want a VAT invoice and an engineer report, and both come afterwards.
About Merrington Lane, for a moment
Merrington Lane is a suburban area located inland in County Durham, sitting at an elevation of 122 metres. Merrington Lane is situated near the cities of Durham and the towns of Spennymoor and Low Spennymoor, and is characterized by its semi-detached housing. Merrington Lane is a relatively small community, with a population of approximately 538 residents. Merrington Lane is connected to the wider region, with Durham city centre just 5.9 miles away.
AdBlue drains in Merrington Lane and across Durham
AdBlue jobs around Merrington Lane go to teams that cover the places near it — Low Spennymoor, Spennymoor as well as North Close — and much of Durham further out, throughout DL postcodes. Close to a boundary, or somewhere awkward to explain? Checking is better than assuming, and so ring.
No moving is needed. In Merrington Lane, a residential suburb, a mobile service works: the vehicle is emptied on the spot, whether in a driveway, a side street, a parking area or a filling station.
What does AdBlue in a diesel tank cost to sort out around Merrington Lane?
Because the jobs differ, a flat figure would not be honest. What changes the price is, first, whether the motor has been running and for how long; then how much AdBlue got in; and after that where your car is and whether a van can reach it safely, which is simpler on an open driveway than in a tight gap behind Durham Mining Museum.
Before a quote, not afterwards, each enquiry from Merrington Lane begins with three questions: the liquid, the amount, plus if it ran. The replies turn a range into a straight quote.
Before anyone sets off, you hear the quote on the phone. And you pay on the day, by card or over the phone, with nothing in advance. Misfuelling cover is part of many insurance policies, so it is worth looking at yours before the van arrives.
Still next to the vehicle around Merrington Lane?
Not touching your car is, then, the best move you can do. Ignition off, motor off, keys out. Tell us it's AdBlue, roughly what quantity, and if it ran, on 0333 366 0103. After that Petrol in Diesel takes over, in Merrington Lane or wherever in Durham.