Avoiding AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Pewsham: Why It Happens
AdBlue already in your diesel tank? Then put this page aside for now, leave your ignition and motor off, then ring 0333 366 0103. A drain plus a full flush, done just where your car sits around Pewsham, is usually what it needs if caught before your motor runs. Not happened yet? Further down, the page explains the why it occurs and the ways to prevent it for good.
AdBlue in a diesel motor: two tanks, two fillers
Plenty of current diesels on the roads around Pewsham and Derry Hill carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to the motor. Stored in a tank of its own, AdBlue is fed into the exhaust stream to clean it.
Separate tanks, separate fillers. Under one flap, next to each other: that's the arrangement on a lot of cars. Elsewhere, AdBlue's filler is under the bonnet or in your boot instead. The diesel side is fuelled at the pump all the time. Someone who has to stop and work out where it goes normally fills the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and far less frequently. It is in the gap that the error happens.
AdBlue in the diesel tank in Pewsham: how it occurs
Carelessness seldom causes it. What does is three things coming up at once.
Haste follows from the warning. The car warns you as AdBlue runs low, and a dry tank puts the vehicle into limp mode — so the top-up gets done quickly, before work on a drive off King Henry Roundabout, or heading home in the car park outside Old Lane.
Then the vehicle is unfamiliar. A hire car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't, and your hand reaches for the cap it would have used on the old one.
Third, the spout goes in: a diesel filler or AdBlue one, it goes in as readily, and once the pour begins, no part stops it. The same few seconds decide it, in the middle of Pewsham or out in Gladstone Parade.
Telling the AdBlue filler from the diesel filler
Before you pour anything, whether on a drive in Stanley or a forecourt around Pewsham, check these. They take a couple of seconds.
- Read the cap rather than going by position: AdBlue ones are regularly blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel caps usually aren't.
- On many cars, the size gives it away: AdBlue has the smaller filler neck.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Many vehicles say there which fuel goes where.
- In the boot or under the bonnet: that is where your filler is if it is not by the diesel cap, and the handbook tells you which.
- The person who drove the vehicle last. On a hire or company car picked up from somewhere like the car park outside Chippenham, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach the diesel tank
Anywhere around Wiltshire the light comes on, this is a routine for the day.
- Turn off once parked — flat ground, motor off, and never in a rush by King Henry Drive on the verge.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, once you find the AdBlue filler and read it. Silly, perhaps, yet it works.
- The diesel cap stays on. Where the two sit under a flap, make sure it is shut before the bottle comes up.
- Gently is best, through the bottle's own spout, till it is full or the bottle runs out.
- Only then, start the car: close the cap, check again, and make sure the diesel cap was never opened.
Spot at step two or three that it has already gone into your diesel side? So stop just there. Do not go on to step five.
Pewsham: already put AdBlue in the diesel tank?
Then the order of things is short. Do not start your motor. On plenty of diesels the ignition alone runs the fuel pump, so don't switch the vehicle on. AdBlue doesn't mix with diesel — it sinks to the bottom of that tank, where the fuel is sucked from — so don't top up with diesel to dilute it.
Ask the staff to help roll your car clear of the petrol pump if you are on a forecourt — the Sovereign Service Station, the Esso or somewhere else. Your own driveway in Pewsham is where it stays.
If the motor has already run, stop as soon as it is safe and switch off. Leave the M4 — under 5 miles out of Pewsham — at the first exit. Roughly how far did it go? Hopping across Pewsham is smaller work than a run of under 15 miles towards Bath, so say.
What occurs when our technicians arrive in Pewsham
Our technicians come to the vehicle wherever it has stopped, whether that's outside Kings Lodge Primary School, near Pewsham Community Centre or on your own driveway. Those replies decide the work and the price, so our technicians ask what was put in, roughly how much, and if it has run. No one sets off until you've heard the quote over the phone.
Emptying the tank comes next, then a thorough flush of the fuel system. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it doesn't wash out on its own — which is why that counts more here than with petrol. The filter is flushed, or replaced where it needs to be; fresh diesel goes in; and the vehicle is tested. Then our engineers fire it up and check it runs smoothly before leaving.
Most jobs are finished in roughly half an hour once our technicians get there, provided the engine has not run — and the pumps we use are fine on a live forecourt yet quiet at night outside a house. Payment is on the day, not upfront, and you receive the paperwork your insurer asks for: an engineer's report and a VAT invoice. Before we get there, take a look at your insurance documents; plenty include cover for misfuelling.
About Pewsham itself
Pewsham is a locality situated on the riverside in Wiltshire, with an elevation of 56 metres above sea level. Pewsham lies near the city of Bath, approximately 12 miles away, and is also close to Chippenham and Lackham. Pewsham has a population of around 825 people and predominantly features detached housing. Pewsham is located in the South West region of England, about 85 miles from London.
Pewsham and Wiltshire: AdBlue drains across the area
As a small village, Pewsham has the same vans as nearby places — Chippenham, Lackham — right across SN postcodes and the surrounding area around them. Our van reaches you fastest with a postcode starting SN15 3.
The vehicle stays put. Our technicians drain it where it is — a side street close to Chippenham Christian Fellowship, a lay-by on the way to Pewsham Park, a driveway. Ring and ask instead of assuming if you're close to a border, or somewhere hard to describe, like the back of Kingdom Hall of Jehovahs Winesses.
In short, for Pewsham drivers
Pour no AdBlue till you've read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank regardless, leave it off then ring 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it stands, anywhere across Wiltshire.