AdBlue in the Diesel Tank in Northbrook? Keep It Switched Off
If AdBlue has gone into your diesel tank, keep the motor off and keep your ignition off. Urea dissolved in water is what AdBlue is. It doesn't burn, it doesn't mix with diesel, and the damage it does begins when the system draws it in. Caught before your engine has run, AdBlue in a diesel tank is normally a drain and a thorough flush, done where the car is in Northbrook. Ring 0333 366 0103 before you do anything else.
Northbrook, AdBlue in your diesel tank: what to do straight away
Things to do:
- Remove the keys, which stops anyone switching the power on.
- Hazards on, if moving traffic is at all near.
- So you can tell us which liquid it was and roughly how much, save the receipt or the empty bottle.
- Call right where you are. Say a SN10 4 postcode or the nearest street sign, and no one has to hunt for you.
Things not to do:
- Do not start the engine, even for a moment to shift the vehicle.
- Turning the key to ignition alone sets your pump running on many diesels. Avoid it.
- Adding extra diesel does not help: AdBlue separates out rather than thinning.
- Keep the vehicle where it is instead of driving it anywhere, even a short distance up Spin Hill.
- Emptying that tank on your own beside the road isn't worth trying.
The attendants on duty at any Northbrook filling station — the Murco included — will usually lend a hand rolling it aside if you ask. If you are on your own drive, leave it exactly where it is.
What does AdBlue do in a diesel tank?
Not your engine but the exhaust is where AdBlue is meant to go. From a separate reservoir it is fed straight to your exhaust, treating what your engine emits. Not one side suits the other: urea doesn't belong in a pump, and a pump can't deal with urea.
Inside a diesel tank it behaves very differently from fuel. It does not mix in. It drops, since it is denser than diesel, and pools low where the pickup takes its supply from. The first thing the system pulls through, once it runs, is the AdBlue. So a vehicle that had AdBlue poured in on a drive in Easterton Sands last night, and has not been started since, is still the straightforward case: the AdBlue is lying at the bottom of that tank, and nothing has pulled it in.
Two kinds of damage follow from there. What is left when the water goes is urea, which forms crystals: they settle in tiny channels and block filters. Worse, it attacks some metals in the fuel system, and keeps going till it is flushed out. If the AdBlue has reached the pipework, waiting overnight in Northbrook makes things worse. In that tank alone, waiting does nothing. Then there's the water: it brings no lubrication to the components that need it most — the injection pump and each injector.
Petrol or AdBlue in a diesel: why AdBlue is regularly worse
A problem of thinned fuel is what you end up with after filling a diesel with petrol at the Esso. It mixes with the diesel, and while it's inside that tank it does no damage; the damage comes from running your motor on it.
AdBlue in a diesel is a fault of the wrong substance altogether. Not burning, it cannot just be run through. It doesn't stay mixed, and so it cannot be thinned. And crystals and corrosion don't wash out with the next tank of fuel. That is why the flush matters more with AdBlue than with petrol, and why starting your engine "to see" costs more here than almost anywhere else, whether the car is in Easterton or the middle of Northbrook.
The same good news applies as with petrol. Never started? Then the AdBlue sits just in that tank, the easiest section of the entire system to empty, wherever the vehicle has come to rest in Wiltshire.
AdBlue in a diesel tank around Northbrook: how it ends up there
It's not deliberate. Many vehicles keep the AdBlue cap beside the diesel inlet, now and then behind a single flap, and muddling them up is simple in poor light. Usually it is never the filling station: someone picks up a bottle heading home and tips it in outside the house.
Usually, it happens in one of a few familiar ways. The refill is rushed outside St Barnabas Church of England School, Market Lavington, because the dash flashed with a warning as the children were dropped off. In the evening, a container is tipped in on a drive near Canada Rise. One more pattern: darkness, the car park by Green Dragon, and someone using that flap for the first time.
Rented cars, new motors, fleet cars, or the second vehicle in a family with one of each: the least known cars see it most. Wherever in Wiltshire, Northbrook included, the slip does not change, and nor does the first response: leave it off.
Already started your engine with AdBlue in your diesel tank in Northbrook?
Then the AdBlue has left that tank. Via the fuel filter, through the lines, and — given any running time — on to the injection pump and each injector: that is how far it has gone.
Maybe returning from Elisha Field, or part way across Northbrook, your motor may run lumpy, smoke, drop pace, flash the dash or stall. When you safely can, pull over and turn everything off — with no restarting to test. With each start, more of that is pulled through.
If you were on the M4, under 25 miles from Northbrook, come off at the next exit and stop somewhere safe rather than pressing on.
How far it went matters. A few hundred yards across Northbrook to the car park by Market Lavington Museum is a very different job from a run towards Bath, under 25 miles away, with the AdBlue reaching further into the fuel system with each mile. Tell us about how far it had come.
Once the motor has run, the flush takes in more, and all of it is done where the car has come to a stop. When it is caught early, permanent damage is very uncommon.
Emptying AdBlue in a diesel around Northbrook: what it takes
The vehicle remains put, whether that is a street beside The Manor House, a driveway, a layby or a filling station in Northbrook, and the van travels to it. Before anything else we ask what was put in, roughly how much, and if your engine has been run, since those answers determine the work.
Next, emptying the tank on the spot removes the contaminated diesel along with the AdBlue in one go. The system is flushed thoroughly, which matters more with AdBlue than with petrol, because what it leaves behind doesn't rinse out on its own. Testing the car comes last, after clean diesel goes in and the fuel filter gets flushed or, where needed, replaced. The majority of these jobs are a half-hour visit once our technicians get there, if the engine hasn't run. Our pumping gear is explosion-proof, and so a busy filling station is no fault, and it's hushed enough for a residential street after dark.
Bleeding the fuel system with clean diesel comes at the end. Whether it is a parking space outside Melksham or a drive in Northbrook, that is where our technicians start the car and you drive off. We check it runs smoothly on new diesel before we go. Our engineers do it all wherever your car has stopped, and it never needs to be taken to a garage. Your insurer is likely to want an engineer's report and your VAT invoice — each handed over afterwards.
About Northbrook, briefly
Northbrook is a suburban area in Wiltshire, situated inland at an elevation of around 104 metres, and is located near the towns of Market Lavington and Devizes. Northbrook sits within commuting distance of the city of Bath, which is approximately 17 miles away. Northbrook has a population of around 909 people and is characterised by predominantly detached housing. Northbrook is also close to nearby places such as Fiddington Sands and Lavington Sands.
AdBlue drains across Wiltshire, Northbrook included
Fiddington Sands, Lavington Sands and Market Lavington are among the places around Northbrook that the same teams serve, together with much of Wiltshire beyond, over the SN postcode area. Assuming won't help by a border or anywhere tricky to describe; phone and ask.
Anywhere your car stands — a drive at home, a side street, a parking area, a filling station — we drain it there, and there's no need to take it to us; which suits Northbrook, a residential suburb, well.
What AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to put right around Northbrook
There is no fair single price, because the jobs aren't the same. Whether the engine has run, and for how long, comes first in what shifts the cost. How much AdBlue got in comes next, and then the position of the vehicle, because an open drive is easier for our van to reach safely than a tight spot behind St Mary of the Assumption.
Which fluid went in, how much, and whether it ran: each Northbrook enquiry begins by asking exactly that, before a figure, never afterwards. Once those are known, a range becomes one firm figure.
Before anyone sets off, you hear our price on the phone. And you pay on the day, by card or over the phone, with nothing upfront. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it's worth checking yours whilst we are on the way.
Northbrook: still next to the car?
Not touching your car is, right now, the best move you can do. Engine off, keys out, ignition off. Phone 0333 366 0103: AdBlue, roughly how much, plus whether it ran is everything our engineers need. Petrol in Diesel takes over the remainder across Wiltshire, Northbrook too.