AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Newtongrange: How It Occurs and How to Prevent It
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave your motor and your ignition off then phone 0333 366 0103. Normally, when the motor hasn't run, it's emptied and fully purged where your car is around Newtongrange. The rest of this page explains why it happens and how to make sure it does not — useful if you're reading before it has happened.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel motor
Many newer diesels in Bryans, like those in Newtongrange, run on two liquids; your engine gets only the diesel. Your exhaust, not your motor, is where AdBlue ends up: dosed into the fumes to clean it, from its own tank.
There's a filler on each tank. Under one flap, next to each other: that's the layout on a lot of cars. On others, AdBlue's filler sits beneath the bonnet or in your boot instead. At the petrol pump, the diesel side gets filled constantly. Someone who has to stop and work out where it goes usually fills the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and much less often. The mistake lives in that gap.
How does AdBlue in your diesel tank occur in Newtongrange?
Three things tend to come together, and carelessness is rarely one of them.
To start with, the warning. Low AdBlue triggers a warning from the car, and running out means limp mode — hence a rushed top-up, perhaps before work off St Davids, or at The Dean Tavern on the way home that evening.
Unfamiliar vehicles come second, as well. Hire cars, new vehicles and company vehicles put their fillers in new places, and the hand reaches for the cap used on the old one.
No part stops the pour after it has started, since a bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one. The bottle fits. Monkswood or the heart of Newtongrange: it takes the same few seconds in both.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Check these first, on a forecourt around Newtongrange or a driveway out in Mayfield. Seconds, that's all.
- Where it sits can mislead; the cap doesn't. AdBlue ones are often blue or bear the name "AdBlue" — diesel ones usually do not.
- On many vehicles, size gives it away: AdBlue gets the smaller filler neck.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Plenty of vehicles say there which fuel goes where.
- The handbook shows which it is if your filler isn't next to your diesel cap: your boot, or under the bonnet.
- The person who drove it last. On a hire or company car picked up from somewhere like the car park outside the nearest station, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching the diesel tank
For the day the light comes on — wherever you are around Midlothian — a routine to follow.
- Not in a rush on the side of Dean Park, not on a slope, not with the engine running: park then switch off properly.
- Find the AdBlue filler, read the cap, and say the name "AdBlue" aloud while you unscrew it. It seems silly. It works.
- Both under one flap? So confirm the cap on the diesel filler stays shut before lifting the bottle.
- Using the bottle's own spout, tip slowly — and stop when it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Only after that, start your car: close the cap, check again, and make sure the diesel cap was never opened.
Discover at the second or third stage that AdBlue went in the diesel tank? That's where you stop. Step five is out.
Newtongrange: already put AdBlue in the diesel tank?
Don't start your engine: that's where the short order of things begins. On plenty of diesels the ignition alone runs the fuel pump, and so don't switch the vehicle on. Topping up with diesel will not weaken it: rather than mixing, AdBlue sinks to the base of your tank, right where the fuel is drawn from.
Ask the staff to help push the car clear of the petrol pump if you are on a forecourt — the Shell, the BP or somewhere else. On your own drive around Newtongrange? So the car stays put.
If your engine has already run, stop as soon as it is safe and switch off. The next junction is where to come off if you are on the M8, under 15 miles from Newtongrange. About how far did it go? Hopping across Newtongrange is less a job than a run of under 10 miles to Edinburgh, so tell us.
Newtongrange: what takes place when our technicians arrive
Our van comes to the car anywhere it has come to rest — your own drive, beside Mining Memorial, or by the local primary school. The answers decide this work and the quote, and so our engineers ask what was put in, roughly how much, and if it's run. The price comes on the call, before any van leaves.
Then your tank is drained and the system cleaned thoroughly. With AdBlue that matters more than with petrol: it crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it does not wash out on its own. Your filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; fresh diesel goes in; and your car is tested. Your engine is fired up next and tested to be sure it runs properly, all before our technicians go.
With pumps safe on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night, most jobs in which your engine has not run need about half an hour once our engineers arrive. The insurer will ask for the engineer's report and your VAT invoice, and you get both once this job is done. Payment is on the day, with no money upfront. Misfuelling cover is included in plenty of insurance policies — and so use the wait to look at yours.
About Newtongrange, for a moment
Newtongrange is a village situated on the riverside in Midlothian, with a mix of terraced housing and other residential properties, and is located approximately 7.6 miles from Edinburgh. Newtongrange has a population of around 2362 people and is set at an elevation of 95 metres, near to other local places such as Monkswood and Lothianbridge. Newtongrange is part of the wider Edinburgh commuter belt, with the city centre being a short distance away.
AdBlue drains across Midlothian, Newtongrange included
Throughout EH postcodes, our teams that cover Newtongrange — a village — work the surrounding places too, Gowkshill and Lothianbridge included. Our van gets to you fastest with a postcode starting EH22 4.
The car doesn't need to shift. Our engineers drain it where it is — a side street near Miners' Memorial, a lay-by on the way to Newbattle Bowling Club, a driveway. If you are close to a boundary, or somewhere hard to explain like the back of Newbattle Congregational Church, ring and ask rather than assuming.
Newtongrange motorists: the short version
Before you pour, read the cap. Petrol in Diesel drains it on the spot, anywhere across Midlothian, if AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank regardless — so leave the vehicle off and call 0333 366 0103.