AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Piccadilly: Why It Happens and How to Prevent It
AdBlue already in your diesel tank? In that case set this page aside a moment, leave your ignition and motor off, and call 0333 366 0103. In Piccadilly, catching it before your engine runs usually means draining and a thorough flush where it stands. If you are reading before it has happened, the rest of this page is about why it happens and how to make sure it doesn't.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel motor
Many modern diesels on the roads around Piccadilly and Ryecroft carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to your motor. Kept in a tank of its own, AdBlue is sprayed into the exhaust stream to clean it.
Separate tanks, different fillers. Some vehicles keep the AdBlue filler in your boot or under the bonnet; plenty of others place both together behind one flap. Filling your diesel side at the petrol pump happens constantly. Someone who has to stop and work out where it goes usually fills the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and much less frequently. It is in the gap that the slip lives.
Piccadilly: how AdBlue in the diesel tank happens
It's rarely carelessness. Three things tend to line up.
To start with, the warning. Low AdBlue brings a warning from your car, and letting it run out leads to limp mode — hence a rushed top-up, perhaps before work off Elmville Avenue, perhaps outside The High House on the way home after work.
Unfamiliar vehicles come next, as well. Hire cars, new motors and company cars put their fillers differently, and habit goes for the cap used on the old one.
A spouted bottle meets no resistance at a diesel filler no more than at an AdBlue one. And so the tip, after begun, carries on. It's a few seconds, whether in Kilnhurst or right in the centre of Piccadilly.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Check these before pouring, on a forecourt around Piccadilly or a driveway out in Bow Broom. A few seconds, no more.
- Blue and lettering: an AdBlue cap is regularly blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap normally doesn't. Trust the cap, not its position.
- On plenty of cars, the size tells: AdBlue gets the smaller filler neck.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Plenty of motors say there which fuel goes where.
- Cannot find it next to your diesel inlet? Then check beneath the bonnet or in your boot — the owner's manual will say where.
- The person who drove the car last. On a hire or company car picked up from somewhere like the car park outside Swinton (South Yorks), ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach your diesel tank
When the light comes on, anywhere around South Yorkshire, use this routine.
- Park and switch off. Not on a slope, not with your engine running, and not in a rush on the side of Piccadilly Road.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, once you find the AdBlue filler and reading it. Daft, yes, yet it does the trick.
- If both sit under one flap, check the diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — and leave the vehicle on.
- Using the bottle's own spout, tip slowly — and stop when it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Before starting the vehicle, shut the cap and look again that the diesel cap never opened off.
Spot at stage two or three that it has already gone into your diesel side? So stop right there. Never carry on to step five.
Put AdBlue in your diesel tank in Piccadilly already?
What follows is a short order of things, beginning with no starting your motor. The fuel pump runs on many diesels as soon as the ignition goes on — and so keep it off. Don't top up with diesel to dilute it: AdBlue does not mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of the tank, where your fuel is pulled from.
Ask the staff to help roll the car away from the petrol pump if you are on a forecourt — the JET, the Shell or anywhere else. If you are on your own driveway in Piccadilly, leave the vehicle where it is.
If your engine has already run, stop as soon as it is safe then switch off. The next junction is the place to come off when you're on the M18, under 5 miles from Piccadilly. Tell us roughly how far it went: a run towards Doncaster, under 10 miles away, is a bigger job than a short hop across Piccadilly.
Piccadilly: what takes place when we arrive
Our van reaches your car anywhere it stopped — your own drive, near St Johns, or outside Kilnhurst St Thomas' CofE Primary Academy. What fluid went in, the quantity, and whether it ran: we ask since the replies set both work and price. That quote comes on the call, before any van leaves.
Draining your tank comes next, followed by a full flush of the fuel system. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, and so it doesn't wash out on its own — which is why the flush counts more with AdBlue than with petrol. Once the filter is cleaned — or renewed, where needed — fresh diesel is added, and then the vehicle is tested. We do not leave until it has been started and is running smoothly.
If the engine hasn't run, the majority of jobs take about half an hour once we're there, using pumps that are safe on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark. Your insurer usually wants an engineer's report and your VAT invoice, and you get both at the end. Payment is on the day, with no deposit. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it is worth checking yours while we are on the way.
About Piccadilly
Piccadilly is a suburban area in South Yorkshire, situated near the River Don and close to the towns of Kilnhurst and Swinton. Piccadilly has a mix of housing types, but semi-detached homes are the most common, and it is located about 8 miles from Doncaster. Piccadilly sits at an elevation of around 51 metres, near the Sandhill area. Piccadilly is part of the larger Yorkshire and the Humber region, but it is distinct from the more famous Piccadilly in London, which is over 145 miles away.
AdBlue drains in Piccadilly and across South Yorkshire
Swinton and Sandhill are among the towns around Piccadilly, a residential suburb, that the same vans cover, over S postcodes. Quote a postcode that starts S64 8, and our van gets there fastest.
Moving your car isn't necessary. Our engineers drain it where it is — a side street near Swinton Community Library, a lay-by on the way to Long Plantation, a driveway. If you're close to a boundary, or somewhere hard to describe like the back of Civic Hall, ring and ask rather than guessing.
In short, for Piccadilly motorists
Read the cap before you pour. AdBlue in your diesel tank regardless? Keep the vehicle off then ring 0333 366 0103; Petrol in Diesel empties it on the spot, throughout South Yorkshire.