Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Pen-y-Bont
With AdBlue in your diesel tank, the ignition remains off and so does your motor. Chemically, AdBlue is simply urea in water. As it is water-based, it will not burn and won't blend with diesel; damage just starts when your pump begins pulling it. Caught before your engine has run, AdBlue in a diesel tank is generally a drain and a thorough flush, done where your car is around Pen-y-Bont. Ring 0333 366 0103 before you do anything else.
Those opening minutes: AdBlue in your diesel tank around Pen-y-Bont
To do:
- Take your keys out, so nobody switches your ignition on.
- If you are at all close to moving traffic, put your hazards on.
- So you can tell us which liquid it was and about how much, keep the receipt or the empty bottle.
- Call us from where you are. A postcode starting SA10 8, or the name of the nearest street, brings the van to you without a search.
Things not to do:
- Do not start the engine, even for a moment to shift the car.
- Your ignition stays off: on lots of diesels, turning it on is enough to run your pump.
- AdBlue does not dilute in diesel — it separates out — so adding extra diesel will not weaken it.
- Keep it where it is rather than driving it anywhere, even a short stretch down Main Road.
- Don't try to drain it yourself at the kerbside.
The staff on duty at any Pen-y-Bont forecourt — the Asda included — will usually help rolling it aside if you ask. On your own driveway, don't touch it at all.
What does AdBlue do in a diesel tank?
Not your motor but the exhaust is where AdBlue is meant to go. Kept in a dedicated tank, it is squirted into the exhaust stream to treat the gases. No part in an injection pump is made for this fluid — and no part of that was intended to travel that way.
Inside a diesel tank it behaves really differently from fuel. It does not mix in. The intake takes fuel from the deepest part of your tank, and that's precisely where AdBlue ends up: as it is denser than diesel, it sinks. A motor topped up on a driveway in Caeralem yesterday evening and not started since counts as the simple one. No pump has sucked the AdBlue up so far — but when your engine runs, that is what is pulled first, straight from the bottom of your tank.
From there it does two kinds of damage. It eats at certain metals found in fuel systems, attacking whatever it touches until it is cleared from your system. And when the water goes, the urea forms crystals that block filters and settle in narrow passages. A motor left standing around Pen-y-Bont with AdBlue already in its lines is worse by the morning; one with AdBlue only in its tank isn't. Diesel lubricates the injection pump and each injector as it flows; water offers no lubrication, and that is a separate kind of harm.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel frequently the bigger fault?
A fault of thin fuel is what you end up with from filling a diesel with petrol at the Texaco. It mixes with your diesel, and whilst it's inside that tank it causes no harm; the harm comes from running your motor on it.
The issue with AdBlue in a diesel is a completely wrong liquid. Because it doesn't burn, running it through is not an option. Nor can it be thinned, since it separates back out — and the following fill will not clear away crystals or corrosion. So the flush matters for more with AdBlue, and turning the key "to see", in the centre of Pen-y-Bont or out in Glan-rhyd, does more harm than almost any other slip.
With AdBlue, the good news is no distinct from petrol. Clearing a tank is the easiest job on a fuel system, and with no start-up, the AdBlue remains in there — anywhere around Neath Port Talbot your vehicle has stopped.
How AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank around Pen-y-Bont
Many vehicles put the AdBlue filler beside the diesel cap, now and then behind a single flap, and after dark the two may look identical. No one means it. A container picked up while driving home and poured in at home, rather than at the filling station, is the usual story.
Usually, it takes place in one of a few familiar ways. Halfway through the morning drop-off, the dashboard flags it up, and outside the local primary school the top-up is hurried. Near Treforgan Road, a driver pours a bottle in on the drive after work. Or a driver unfamiliar with that flap refills your car in dim light, stopped in the car park outside The Gradon.
The least familiar vehicles see it most — hire cars, brand-new ones, fleet cars, and the other motor of a family with both fuel types. Anywhere around Neath Port Talbot, Pen-y-Bont included, the slip does not change, and neither does the first response: keep it off.
AdBlue in the diesel tank around Pen-y-Bont, and the engine started?
Then the tank is no longer where the AdBlue is. Your filter and lines have had it sucked through, and any running takes it on to the high-pressure pump and every injector.
You may see the motor running unevenly, smoking, losing power, showing warning lights or cutting out, possibly on the way back from Wern Plemys Nature Reserve or halfway across Pen-y-Bont. Stop as soon as it is safe, switch off, and don't restart it to check. Every start pulls more of it through.
Pen-y-Bont sits under 10 miles from the M4; if you were on it, leave by the next junction and stop somewhere safe rather than driving on.
Every mile pushes the AdBlue deeper in. That's why crossing Pen-y-Bont to park near Crynant Community Centre and a drive of under 15 miles towards Swansea are such distinct jobs. Let us know about how far it had come.
Wherever the car came to a stop is where all of it gets done, even with more to clean out once the engine has been started. Very rarely does it leave permanent damage if it is noticed soon.
What does an AdBlue drain on a diesel involve in Pen-y-Bont?
Our engineers come to the vehicle, wherever it has stopped in Pen-y-Bont: a side street near St Margaret's Church, a drive, a lay-by or a forecourt. Three replies decide the job, and so before anything else our engineers ask which fluid went in, about what quantity, plus whether your engine has turned over.
The polluted diesel and the urea come out together when the tank is drained, on the spot. A careful flush matters much more after AdBlue than after petrol, because what remains won't clear away on its own. After that, the fuel filter: flushed, or changed when it must be. Then fresh diesel, and then a check of the vehicle. If your motor hasn't run, the majority of jobs take about half an hour once our engineers are there. The pumps are explosion-proof, safe on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark.
Clean diesel goes in to prime the system, and that's the final step. Firing it up comes next, and then you head off from where the car is parked, outside Neath or on a drive around Pen-y-Bont. The test before we head off is that it runs properly on new diesel. Because the job is done in its entirety where the car is, a garage never comes into it. Insurers ask for a VAT invoice and an engineer report, and both come afterwards.
About Pen-y-Bont and where it is
Pen-y-Bont is a suburban area situated on the riverside in Neath Port Talbot, with a mix of semi-detached housing and a population of around 742 residents. Pen-y-Bont sits at an elevation of 102 metres, close to the nearby communities of Tre-Forgan and Creunant. Pen-y-Bont is located near the city of Swansea, which is approximately 11.6 miles away. Pen-y-Bont occupies a scenic spot in the Welsh countryside, with the capital city London being around 156.2 miles to the east.
AdBlue drains across Neath Port Talbot, Pen-y-Bont included
Tre-Forgan, Creunant and Nant-y-cafn are among the towns around Pen-y-Bont that the same vans reach, along with most of Neath Port Talbot beyond, throughout the SA postcode area. Near a boundary, or somewhere awkward to explain? Asking is better than assuming, and so phone.
A van that comes to you fits Pen-y-Bont, a residential suburb: there's no need to bring the vehicle to us, because our technicians empty it on the spot, in a drive, a residential street, a parking area or a filling station.
Pen-y-Bont: what AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to fix
Because the callouts differ, a flat price would not be honest. The price shifts first with how long, if at all, your engine has been running, and next with the quantity of AdBlue that was put in. After that it depends on where your car is and whether a technician can reach it safely, which is easier on an open drive than in a tight space behind Dulais Valley Quads.
Before any quote, not after, every enquiry from Pen-y-Bont opens with the same three questions: the fuel, the amount, plus whether the engine ran. Given those replies, the range shrinks to one fixed number.
Quoted by phone before the engineer heads out, it is settled on the day — card or phone, nothing in advance. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it's worth checking yours while we are on the way.
In Pen-y-Bont and still alongside the car?
Then the most handy thing you can do is nothing to the car. Keys out; motor and ignition off. Tell us it's AdBlue, about what quantity, and whether it ran, on 0333 366 0103. From there Petrol in Diesel handles it, in Pen-y-Bont or wherever within Neath Port Talbot.