North Weald Bassett: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Avoid It?
Pause here for a moment if your diesel tank already holds AdBlue in it: ignition off, engine off, then call 0333 366 0103. Normally, when your motor has not turned, it is drained and thoroughly cleaned where the car sits around North Weald Bassett. If you are reading before it has happened, the remainder of this page is about why it happens and how to make sure it does not.
AdBlue in a diesel motor: two tanks, two fillers
Many newer diesels in Bovinger, like those in North Weald Bassett, run on two liquids; the motor gets just the diesel. The exhaust, not the motor, is where AdBlue ends up: sprayed into the gas to clean them, from a separate tank.
There's a filler on every tank. Under one flap, side by side: that's the layout on a lot of cars. Elsewhere, AdBlue's filler sits beneath the bonnet or in the boot instead. At the petrol pump, your diesel side is topped up all the time. A driver who has to stop and think where it goes normally fills the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and far less frequently. That gap is where the error lives.
AdBlue in your diesel tank in North Weald Bassett: how it takes place
Carelessness rarely explains it. Instead is three things coming up at once.
To start with, the warning. Low AdBlue brings a message from the vehicle, and running out leads to limp mode — hence a rushed top-up, perhaps before work off Queens Road, or at The Kings Head on the way home after work.
Then the vehicle is unfamiliar. A hire car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers where your last one did not, and the hand reaches for the cap it would have used on the old one.
A spouted bottle meets no resistance at a diesel filler any more than at an AdBlue one. And so the tip, after begun, carries on. Tylers Green or the heart of North Weald Bassett: it is the same few seconds in both.
The AdBlue filler and your diesel filler: telling them apart
Check these before pouring, at a forecourt around North Weald Bassett or a driveway over in Greensted Green. A few seconds, that's all.
- Check the cap rather than going by position: AdBlue caps are regularly blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel ones usually are not.
- Plenty of cars fit AdBlue the smaller neck of the two.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Plenty of motors say there which fuel goes where.
- The handbook. If your filler isn't by your diesel cap, it's in the boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- Whoever had it before knows. Ask when you pick up a rental or company car — at Harlow Mill's car park, perhaps — rather than when the light appears.
How to top up without AdBlue in your diesel tank
On the day the light appears — wherever it is around Essex — a routine to follow.
- Park then switch off. Not on a slope, not with your motor running, and not in a rush on the side of Lysander Court.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds silly and it works.
- If both sit under one flap, check your diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — and leave the car on.
- Tip slowly, using the bottle's own spout. Stop when it's full or when the bottle is empty.
- Shut the cap, then check again — making sure your diesel cap remained closed the whole time. Only then, start the vehicle.
If at step two or three you find you have already poured into the diesel side, stop there. Do not go on to stage five.
North Weald Bassett: already put AdBlue in your diesel tank?
Brief order, then. Top of that: your engine stays unstarted. Leave your ignition off as well, since on plenty of diesels switching it on alone runs your pump. Topping up with diesel will not dilute it: instead, AdBlue sinks to the bottom of your tank, just where the fuel is taken from.
On a forecourt — JET, Harvest Energy or any other — the attendants will normally help push the car clear, if you ask. If you are on your own drive in North Weald Bassett, leave the vehicle where it stands.
Already run? Pull over once it is safe, then turn off. North Weald Bassett sits under 3 miles from the M11; on it, take the first junction. Distance matters — a quick hop across North Weald Bassett makes a smaller job than heading under 15 miles towards Chelmsford — so tell us roughly how far it went.
North Weald Bassett: what takes place when we turn up
By St Andrew's CofE Primary School, near North Weald Village Sign or on your own driveway: wherever the vehicle has stopped, our engineers come to it. The answers settle the work and our price, and so our engineers ask what got in, about how much, and if it has run. On the call itself, you are told the price — ahead of anything else.
Then that tank is drained and the fuel system rinsed thoroughly. Much more than with petrol, it matters here: the crystals form, some metals are attacked, and none of that clears away on its own, however long it is left. Testing is last: before that, fresh diesel is added, and your filter is cleaned or replaced as needed. The engine is started next and checked to confirm it runs smoothly, all before our engineers go.
With pumps fine on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night, most jobs where the motor hasn't run need roughly half an hour once our technicians arrive. Paying happens on the day, not upfront, and you receive the paperwork an insurer asks for: an engineer report and a VAT invoice. Misfuelling cover is part of plenty of insurance policies — so use the wait to look at yours.
About North Weald Bassett itself
North Weald Bassett is a village in Essex, situated approximately 19 miles north-east of London and 13 miles north of Chelmsford. North Weald Bassett sits in a relatively low-lying area at around 80 metres above sea level, surrounded by other small settlements such as Tylers Green and Colliers Hatch. North Weald Bassett has a population of around 1908 people, predominantly living in semi-detached housing. North Weald Bassett is also near Toot Hill, a small village to the north.
AdBlue drains across Essex, North Weald Bassett included
Over CM postcodes, the teams covering North Weald Bassett — a rural village — work the nearby locations too, Toot Hill and Colliers Hatch included. A postcode starting CM16 6 gets the van to you fastest.
No need to shift the vehicle. Draining takes place on the spot, whether a drive, a street near North Weald Library, or a layby on the way to Memorial Playing Field. Ring and ask instead of assuming if you are close to a boundary, or somewhere hard to describe, like the back of North Weald Methodist Church.
North Weald Bassett drivers: the short version
Tip nothing till you've read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank regardless, leave the vehicle off then call 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel clears it where it sits, anywhere around Essex.