Penmaen: AdBlue in the Diesel Tank? Leave It Off
If AdBlue has got into the diesel tank, leave your engine off then keep the ignition off. In plain terms, AdBlue is simply urea in water. The trouble begins once it's pulled through the lines — it will not burn, and it won't blend with diesel. In Penmaen, AdBlue in a diesel tank found before the engine runs usually comes down to a drain and a thorough flush, just where the vehicle is. First, call us on 0333 366 0103.
Penmaen, AdBlue in your diesel tank: what to do straight away
Do:
- Keys out — then no one can power anything on.
- Hazards on, if moving traffic is anywhere near.
- The empty bottle or your receipt tells us the product and the quantity, so do not throw it out.
- Our van locates you fastest with a postcode starting NP12 0, or simply the name of a street close by, so call from the car.
Never:
- No starting your engine — not for a second, not to reposition the car.
- Switching your key to ignition by itself sets your pump going on many diesels. Skip it.
- No extra fuel on top. The AdBlue will not blend, and so it is wasted.
- Never drive it anywhere, not even a short way up Oakdale Terrace.
- Beside the road, do not attempt emptying it yourself.
At a forecourt around Penmaen, whether it is the Asda or another one, ask the staff to help you roll the vehicle clear of the petrol pump. At home, the car stays just as it is.
What AdBlue does in a diesel tank
The engine is not what AdBlue is made for; your exhaust is. From a separate tank it goes straight to your exhaust, treating what the motor emits. A fuel pump isn't designed to cope with it, and AdBlue was never supposed to travel through one.
Poured in with your diesel, it stays apart instead of mixing — quite different from fuel. Denser than diesel, it drops and pools below it — the same spot the pickup draws from. When the system runs, the AdBlue is top of the list to go through. Until then it waits beneath your diesel, which is how a vehicle filled in Rock yesterday and never started stays the simple case, provided no one turns the key.
Two kinds of damage follow from there. Crystals and corrosion. As the water dries, it leaves urea that hardens in filter elements and narrow passages; meanwhile, because it eats at certain metals, each part it touches keeps suffering for as long as it remains in there. Lines holding AdBlue spell damage by morning for a vehicle parked around Penmaen. Just in your tank, it stays the same. Diesel lubricates the high-pressure pump and every injector as it flows; water gives no lubrication, which is a separate form of damage.
Petrol or AdBlue in a diesel: why AdBlue is frequently worse
Put petrol in a diesel at the another forecourt nearby and you have a problem of thin fuel. Harm only comes from running on it. Blended into your diesel and left inside your tank, it causes none.
The issue with AdBlue in a diesel is a completely wrong substance. It does not burn, so it can't 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 counts more with AdBlue than with petrol, and why starting your engine "to see" costs more here than almost anywhere else, whether your car is in Oakdale or the middle of Penmaen.
As with petrol, there is good news. If your engine has not run, the AdBlue is still in the tank, and the tank is the simplest part of a fuel system to clear, wherever in Caerphilly your car is standing.
Penmaen: how AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank
No one means to do it. The AdBlue filler on many cars waits right next to your diesel filler, at times under the same flap, and the two caps can look alike in poor light. A container bought when heading home and poured in outside the house, rather than at the forecourt, is the typical route.
It tends to take place in a few familiar ways. The top-up gets rushed outside the local primary school, after the dash flashed with a warning as the children were dropped off. A bottle is poured in at the end of the day on a drive just off Penmaen Estate. One more pattern: dim light, the car park outside The Sirhowy, and a driver using that flap for the first time.
It takes place most in the cars people know least: a hire car, a new vehicle, a company car, or the second car of a household with one diesel and one petrol. Anywhere across Caerphilly, Penmaen included, the mistake does not change, and neither does the first step: keep it off.
Penmaen: started the engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank?
Then the tank is no longer where the AdBlue is. It's been drawn through the filter and the lines, and if your motor ran for any time, it has reached the high-pressure pump and the fuel injectors.
Rough running, smoke from the exhaust, dropping power, dashboard lights or stalling: each may appear, maybe part way across Penmaen or returning from Coed Cariad. Stop as soon as it is safe, switch off, and don't restart it to check. More of that is pulled through with each start.
Penmaen sits under 10 miles from the M4; if you were on it, exit by the first junction and pull up safely instead of carrying on.
Hopping across Penmaen to the car park by Army Cadets Blackwood Detachment is one matter; heading towards Newport, under 15 miles away, is something else, because each mile carries the AdBlue further in. So mileage matters. Let us know about how far it had come.
There's more to flush once the motor has run, and we do all of it where the car has ended up. If it's caught quickly, lasting damage is very rare.
Penmaen: how AdBlue is cleared from a diesel
Our engineers come to the vehicle, wherever it has stopped in Penmaen: a side street near Oakdale Library, a drive, a lay-by or a forecourt. Before anything else our technicians ask what got in, roughly how much, and whether the engine has been run, because those replies settle this work.
Then your tank is drained where your car waits, so the contaminated fuel and the AdBlue come out together. A careful flush matters much more with AdBlue than after petrol, because what remains will not clear away by itself. Your filter is flushed, or replaced where it needs to be; fresh diesel goes in; and the vehicle is tested. Most of these jobs are a half-hour job once our engineers arrive, provided your engine hasn't run. The pumps are explosion-proof, fine on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark.
Fresh diesel goes in to bleed the system, and that is the final step. Firing it up comes next, and then you head off from where the car is parked, outside Newbridge or on a driveway around Penmaen. It's tested on fresh diesel to make sure it runs properly before we head off. No workshop is required at any point, with the whole job done then and there. Afterwards, there is the paperwork for your insurer: a VAT invoice plus a report from the engineer.
About Penmaen, briefly
Penmaen is a suburban area in Caerphilly, situated on the banks of a river at an elevation of 209 metres. Penmaen lies approximately 10 miles north of Newport and is surrounded by nearby places such as Woodfieldside, Blackwood, and Cwm Gelli. Penmaen has a population of around 1856 people and predominantly consists of semi-detached housing. Penmaen is located about 131 miles west of London, in the south of Wales.
AdBlue drains across Penmaen and Caerphilly
Throughout the NP postcode area, the vans taking AdBlue jobs in Penmaen reach much of Caerphilly as well, Woodfieldside, Blackwood and Cwm Gelli included. Assuming won't help close to a county line or anywhere hard to describe; phone and ask.
Penmaen is a residential suburb, and a call-out drain suits it: whether the vehicle is on a home drive, a residential street, a car park or a forecourt, our engineers drain it where it stands, so it never needs to be moved to us.
Penmaen: what AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to fix
There's no honest single quote, since the jobs are not the same. Whether your engine has run, and for how long, comes first in what shifts the cost. How much AdBlue got in comes next, and then the location of the vehicle, since an open drive is easier for our van to get to safely than a tight gap behind Studio 54.
Before any quote, not after, every enquiry from Penmaen opens with three questions: the fuel, the quantity, and if the engine ran. Those replies turn a range into a straight quote.
You hear that quote by phone, before anybody sets off, and you pay on the day, by card or over the phone, with nothing upfront. As our engineer is on the way, dig out your policy: plenty include misfuelling.
In Penmaen and still beside your car?
Then, do nothing — that's the best step there is. Keys out; engine and ignition off. Ring 0333 366 0103: AdBlue, roughly how much, and whether it ran are everything we ask. Petrol in Diesel takes over the remainder throughout Caerphilly, Penmaen included.