Portavogie: AdBlue in the Diesel Tank? Leave It Off
With AdBlue in the diesel tank, the ignition stays off and so does your motor. In plain terms, AdBlue is just urea in water. The trouble starts once it's sucked through the pump — it won't ignite, and it will not blend with diesel. Caught before your engine has run, AdBlue in a diesel tank is usually a drain and a thorough flush, done where your car is in Portavogie. Ring 0333 366 0103 before you do anything else.
AdBlue in your diesel tank around Portavogie: the first few minutes
Do these:
- Pocket the keys, and that prevents anyone switching the power on.
- If you are anywhere near moving traffic, put your hazards on.
- The empty bottle or your receipt shows us the product and the amount, and so do not throw it away.
- Give us a postcode starting BT22 1, or whichever street is nearest, and our van reaches you straight — so call wherever you are.
Things not to do:
- Don't start your motor, even for a moment to move the vehicle.
- Many diesels power their fuel pump the moment your ignition goes on, and so leave it off.
- Do not top up with diesel to dilute it. AdBlue does not dilute in diesel; it separates out.
- Any driving at all is to be avoided, including a short stretch up B7065.
- No draining it yourself, at all, at the verge.
Ask the people behind the counter to help you move the car off the pumps if you are on a forecourt in Portavogie, whether it's the the nearest petrol station or elsewhere. If you're on your own drive, leave the vehicle exactly where it is.
AdBlue in a diesel tank, and what it does there
AdBlue is made for your exhaust, not the motor. From a dedicated tank it goes directly to your exhaust, treating what your engine lets out. Nothing in it is meant to pass through a fuel pump, and nothing in a fuel pump is designed to handle it.
Inside a diesel tank it behaves very differently from fuel. It does not mix in. It's heavier than diesel, so it sinks and gathers at the bottom of the tank, which is where the pickup pulls fuel from. When the system runs, the AdBlue is first to go through. Until then it waits beneath the diesel, which is how a vehicle filled in Ballywalter yesterday and never started stays the simple case, as long as nobody turns the key.
Once it is drawn in, the damage takes two forms. As its water goes, the urea left behind crystallises, and the crystals block filters and settle in fine passages. And it is corrosive to some of the metals a fuel system is made from, so it keeps running on the parts it hits for as long as it stays there. By daybreak, a car sitting around Portavogie with AdBlue in its lines grows worse; if it's only in the tank, it doesn't. The water in it does damage of its own: your high-pressure pump and the injectors depend on diesel to lubricate them, and water offers them nothing.
AdBlue in a diesel: why it is often worse than petrol
Put petrol in a diesel at the another forecourt nearby and you have a fault of thin fuel. No harm is done while it sits put, mixed into your diesel — only when your engine runs on it.
The trouble with AdBlue in a diesel is a totally unsuitable substance. It does not burn, so it cannot simply be run through. It doesn't stay mixed, so it can't be thinned. And crystals and corrosion do not wash out with the next tank of fuel. That's why the flush matters more with AdBlue than with petrol, and why starting the motor "to see" costs more here than almost anywhere else, whether your car is in Greyabbey or the middle of Portavogie.
As with petrol, there's good news. Never started? Then the AdBlue sits just inside your tank, the easiest bit of the whole system to clear, anywhere the vehicle has come to rest around County Down.
Portavogie: how AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank
It's not on purpose. Many cars have the AdBlue cap beside the diesel inlet, occasionally under one flap, and muddling them up is easy after dark. Usually it's not the forecourt: someone buys a bottle heading home and tips it in at home.
The ways it takes place are few and familiar. Midway through the drop-off, the dashboard flags it up, and outside the local primary school the refill is hurried. In the evening, a container is tipped in on a driveway close to High Row. Or your car is topped up in the car park at the pub in the village, in poor light, by somebody who has never opened that flap before.
It crops up the most in a hire car, a brand-new vehicle, a fleet vehicle, or the other motor of a home with one of each fuels — the cars drivers know least. Leave it switched off: that is the first response to the same mistake, wherever in Portavogie or the remainder of County Down you are.
AdBlue in your diesel tank in Portavogie, and the motor started?
Then the AdBlue has left your tank. The filter and pipework have had it pulled along, and some running takes it on to the injection pump and each injector.
You may see the motor running unevenly, smoking, losing power, showing warning lights or cutting out, possibly on the way back from the green space at the edge of the village or halfway across Portavogie. No starting it again to test: pull over once it is safe, then turn it off. More of that is pulled through with each start.
On the M77, over 50 miles from Portavogie, the next junction is where to leave, and somewhere safe is where to park — not carrying on.
Hopping across Portavogie to the car park by the centre is one thing; driving towards Belfast, under 25 miles away, is another, because each mile carries the AdBlue deeper in. So distance counts. Let us know about how far it had come.
Wherever the vehicle came to a stop is where all of it gets done, even with more to flush once your engine has been run. Lasting damage is very rare if it's noticed quickly.
Portavogie: how AdBlue is cleared from a diesel
Our engineers come to your car, wherever it has stopped in Portavogie: a side street near a street just off the centre, a drive, a lay-by or a forecourt. The work depends on three replies, and our engineers get before all else — which fluid got in, the quantity, and whether the engine has run.
Then that tank is emptied where your car sits, so the polluted fuel and the AdBlue come out together. Your system is rinsed thoroughly, which matters more with AdBlue than with petrol, because what it leaves behind doesn't rinse out on its own. Clean diesel goes in once the filter is flushed — or replaced, when it needs to be — and then your vehicle is tested. If the motor hasn't run, the majority of jobs take about half an hour once our engineers are there. Low-noise enough for use outside a house at night, and safe on a working forecourt, the pumps are explosion-proof.
The final step is to bleed your system on fresh diesel. Firing it up comes next, and then you head off from where the car is parked, by the nearest station or on a driveway in Portavogie. Before leaving, our technicians check it is running properly with new diesel in. The whole job is done where the car is, so it never has to be taken to a workshop. Your insurer will want an engineer's report and your VAT invoice — both yours once this job is done.
About Portavogie itself
Portavogie is a small coastal locality in County Down, situated near the villages of Ballyhalbert and Cloghy. Portavogie sits at a low elevation of around 12 metres, looking out over the Irish Sea. Portavogie is characterized by its predominantly detached housing stock, reflecting its role as a residential area within commuting distance of Belfast.
AdBlue drains across Portavogie and County Down
Over the BT postcode area, the vans taking AdBlue call-outs around Portavogie serve much of County Down too, Ballyhalbert, Cloghy and Kircubbin among them. Close to a boundary, or anywhere tricky to pin down? Asking is better than guessing, so ring.
A mobile service suits Portavogie, a coastal area: you have no need to bring the car to us, because our technicians drain it on the spot, on a driveway, a residential street, a car park or a forecourt.
What AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to put right in Portavogie
No flat price could be honest, because every job is different. Three things shift the price: whether the motor has been running and for how long, how much AdBlue got in, and where the vehicle is. That last one comes down to whether a van can get to it safely, and an open driveway is simpler than a tight gap behind the far end of the built-up part.
That's why every call from Portavogie starts with the same three questions, asked before giving a figure, not after: what got in, how much, and if it's run. Once they are known, a range becomes a single firm figure.
Before anyone heads out, you are told our price on the phone. And you pay on the day, by card or over the phone, with nothing upfront. Check your insurance whilst we're on the way: plenty include misfuelling cover.
Alongside the car in Portavogie, right now?
Then, touch nothing — that's the most helpful step available. Ignition off, engine off, keys out. Tell us it's AdBlue, roughly what quantity, and whether the engine ran, on 0333 366 0103. From there Petrol in Diesel handles it, across Portavogie or anywhere in County Down.