AdBlue in the Diesel Tank in Putney Vale? Keep It Switched Off
If AdBlue has gone into your diesel tank, leave the engine off then leave your ignition off. AdBlue is urea mixed in water. Being water-based, it will not burn and never combines with diesel; trouble just starts once the pump starts pulling it. If the engine hasn't run yet, AdBlue in a diesel tank is generally drained and thoroughly purged where the car stands in Putney Vale. Before you do anything else, call 0333 366 0103.
Those opening minutes: AdBlue in the diesel tank around Putney Vale
To do:
- Keys out — that way no one can power anything on.
- Hazards on, if moving traffic is anywhere near.
- The empty bottle or the till receipt tells us the fluid and the quantity, and so do not throw it away.
- The van locates you quickest with a postcode starting SW15 3, or just the name of a street nearby, so call from the spot.
Never do these:
- No starting your engine — not for a second, not to shift your car.
- Do not switch your ignition on. On many diesels that alone runs the fuel pump.
- No more fuel added. The AdBlue will not blend, and so it's wasted.
- Any driving at all is to be avoided, including a short distance down A3.
- No emptying it yourself, either, at the verge.
The staff working at any Putney Vale forecourt — the Asda Express included — will usually help rolling it aside if you ask. At your own drive, do not move it at all.
What AdBlue does in a diesel tank
The motor isn't what AdBlue is made for; your exhaust is. Its own reservoir keeps it, and from there it's sprayed into your exhaust, where it cleans the gas. No part in a fuel pump is made for this liquid — and no part of it was meant to travel that way.
Poured in with your diesel, it keeps apart rather than blending — quite unlike fuel. It's heavier than diesel, so it sinks and collects at the bottom of your tank, which is where the pickup pulls fuel from. When the system runs, the AdBlue is first to go through. Before then it waits beneath your diesel, which is how a car topped up in Wimbledon Common yesterday and never started stays the simple one, as long as no one touches your key.
It causes two kinds of harm from there. 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 labouring on the parts it gets to for as long as it remains there. Overnight, a vehicle sitting in Putney Vale with AdBlue in its lines grows worse; where it is just inside the tank, nothing changes. Diesel protects the high-pressure pump and every injector as it passes; water offers none of that, and that is a second kind of damage.
AdBlue in a diesel: why it's regularly worse than petrol
Top up a diesel with petrol in error over at the Shell, and this issue is thinned fuel. It mixes with your diesel, and while it is in that tank it causes no damage; the harm comes from running the motor on it.
AdBlue in a diesel is a problem of the wrong substance altogether. Not burning, it cannot simply be run through. Crystals and corrosion stay after the next tankful, and AdBlue splits again from your diesel, so watering it won't work. That is why the flush counts more, and turning the key "to see" does more harm here than nearly any other slip — in Copse Hill or the heart of Putney Vale alike.
The same good news applies as with petrol. Not run? Then the AdBlue sits only inside the tank, the simplest bit of the entire system to clear, anywhere the vehicle has come to rest in Greater London.
AdBlue in a diesel tank around Putney Vale: how it ends up there
It is not deliberate. Plenty of cars have the AdBlue inlet beside the diesel inlet, now and then behind one flap, and muddling them up is simple after dark. Usually it's not the forecourt: someone buys a bottle driving home and pours it in outside the house.
It tends to happen in a few familiar ways. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up happens in a hurry outside Heathmere Primary School. Near Roehampton Vale, someone pours a container in on the drive in the evening. Another version: darkness, a pub car park outside King's Head, and a driver using that flap for the first time.
The least known vehicles get it the most — rentals, new ones, company ones, and the other vehicle in a home with both fuels. Keep it switched off: that is the first step to an identical slip, wherever in Putney Vale or the remainder of Greater London you happen to be.
Started the engine with AdBlue in your diesel tank around Putney Vale?
The AdBlue has left the tank, then. With any running time, it travels to the high-pressure pump and every injector, after passing via your filter and lines.
You may notice your motor running unevenly, smoking, losing power, showing warning lights or cutting out, perhaps on the way back from Richardson Evans Memorial Playing Fields or halfway across Putney Vale. Stop as soon as it is safe, switch off, and don't restart the vehicle to check. Every start pulls more of it through.
Exit the M4, under 5 miles from Putney Vale, by the next junction and stop safely, not carrying on.
A quick hop across Putney Vale to the car park by REMPF Memorial is one thing; driving towards Westminster, under 10 miles away, is another, because each mile carries the AdBlue further in. So mileage counts. Tell us roughly how far it had come.
Our engineers do all of the cleaning where the vehicle has ended up, and once the engine has been started there is more of it. Permanent damage is very rare when it's spotted quickly.
Putney Vale: how AdBlue is emptied from a diesel
A road beside REMPF Pavilion, a driveway, a layby or a filling station: wherever the vehicle has stopped around Putney Vale, our technicians come to it. Three replies shape the job, and so before anything else our engineers ask what got in, roughly the amount, and if the engine has turned over.
Next, emptying the tank on the spot removes the contaminated diesel and the AdBlue together. Residue from AdBlue will not wash out by itself, so the whole system gets a careful flush, which matters far more with urea than with petrol. Next, the filter: flushed, or replaced when it must be. Then fresh diesel, and then a test of your vehicle. Not run? Then expect roughly half an hour on site for most jobs. 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 prime the fuel system, and that is the last step. Starting the engine comes next, and then you head off from where the vehicle is parked, at Barnes or on a drive in Putney Vale. The test before our engineers head off is that it runs correctly on clean diesel. Our technicians do it all wherever the vehicle has ended up, and it never needs to be taken to a workshop. Your insurer will want an engineer's report and your VAT invoice — both yours once the job is done.
About Putney Vale and where it is
Putney Vale is a suburban area in southwest London, situated on the banks of the River Thames. Putney Vale sits at a low elevation of around 16 metres, with nearby areas including Kingston Vale, Roehampton, and Putney Heath. Putney Vale is predominantly composed of flat dwellings, reflecting its urban character. Putney Vale is located approximately 7 miles from central London, with Westminster just 6.8 miles away.
Putney Vale and Greater London: AdBlue drains across the area
Our vans that answer AdBlue call-outs around Putney Vale also cover the places around it, Kingston Vale, Roehampton and Putney Heath among them, and most of Greater London beyond, across the SW postcode area. Close to a border, or somewhere tricky to pin down? Asking is better than assuming, so phone.
No moving is needed. In Putney Vale, a residential suburb, a mobile service fits: your car is drained on the spot, be it on a driveway, a residential street, a car park or a forecourt.
AdBlue in a diesel tank in Putney Vale: the cost of fixing it
There's no honest single quote, since the jobs are not the same. Whether the motor has run, and for how long, comes first in what shifts the price. How much AdBlue was put in comes next, and then the location of the car, since an open driveway is simpler for our van to get to safely than a tight spot behind Alton Club.
With that in mind, each call from Putney Vale begins with the identical trio — which fluid got in, how much, whether the engine ran — before a quote. When those are answered, a range turns into one fixed figure.
Quoted by phone before the van sets out, the job is paid for that day — card or phone, nothing in advance. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it is worth checking yours whilst we're on the way.
In Putney Vale and still alongside your car?
Then, do nothing — that is the most helpful step available. Keys out; engine and ignition off. Say it was AdBlue, roughly what quantity, and whether the engine ran, on 0333 366 0103. From there Petrol in Diesel takes over, in Putney Vale or wherever in Greater London.