AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Rawnsley? Don't Start It
If AdBlue has gone into your diesel tank, leave your engine off then keep the ignition off. Urea dissolved in water is all AdBlue is. Unlike fuel, it neither burns nor blends, and no harm starts until your engine sucks it round. Caught before your motor has run, AdBlue in a diesel tank is usually a drain and a thorough flush, done where your car is around Rawnsley. Nothing comes before ringing 0333 366 0103.
What to do right now, Rawnsley: AdBlue in the diesel tank
Do these:
- Remove the keys, and that stops anyone turning the power on.
- Hazards on, if moving traffic is anywhere near.
- Keep the receipt or the empty bottle, and so you can tell us what went in and about how much.
- Tell us a postcode starting WS12 1, or whatever street is nearest, and the van reaches you straight — so call wherever you stand.
Things not to do:
- Not even for a second, and not to shift the vehicle: the engine stays off.
- Do not switch the ignition on. On many diesels that alone runs the fuel pump.
- No extra fuel on top. The AdBlue will not blend, and so it's pointless.
- Even a short distance down Longacres is too far to drive it.
- Emptying that tank yourself by the road is not worth trying.
At a forecourt around Rawnsley, whether it is the Esso or another one, ask the attendants to help you push your car clear of the petrol pump. If you are on your own drive, leave it just where it sits.
AdBlue in a diesel tank, and what it does there
The motor isn't what AdBlue is made for; your exhaust is. Kept in a separate tank, it's injected into the exhaust to clean the fumes. Not one side fits the other: urea doesn't belong in a pump, and a pump can't deal with urea.
It doesn't combine. Once it's poured into a tank of diesel, AdBlue acts nothing like fuel. Denser than diesel, it sinks and collects underneath it — the same place the intake draws from. The first thing the system pulls through, once it runs, is the AdBlue. So a motor that had AdBlue poured in on a drive in Church Hill last night, and hasn't been started since, is still the easy case: the AdBlue is lying at the bottom of that tank, and nothing has pulled it in.
Two kinds of damage follow from there. As its water goes, the urea left behind crystallises, and the crystals block filters and settle in fine passages. And it's corrosive to some of the metals a fuel system is made from, and so it keeps working on the components it gets to for as long as it remains there. A motor left sitting around Rawnsley with AdBlue already in its lines is worse by the morning; one with AdBlue just in its tank isn't. Diesel lubricates the injection pump and every injector as it flows; water gives no lubrication, and that is a second form of harm.
Why AdBlue in a diesel is regularly more major than petrol
Put petrol in a diesel at the Texaco and you have a fault of thin fuel. Damage only comes from running on it. Mixed into your diesel and left inside the tank, it causes nothing.
AdBlue in a diesel is another problem: not thin fuel, yet no fuel at all. Because it doesn't burn, running it through isn't an option. It doesn't stay mixed, so it cannot be thinned. And crystals and corrosion do not wash out with the next tank of fuel. That's why the flush counts more with AdBlue than with petrol, and why starting your motor "to see" costs more here than almost anywhere else, whether the car is in Prospect Village or the middle of Rawnsley.
The same good news holds as with petrol. Anywhere in Staffordshire the vehicle has come to rest, an unstarted engine leaves the AdBlue still inside the reservoir: the easiest bit of a fuel system to empty.
AdBlue in a diesel tank in Rawnsley: how it ends up there
Nobody means to do it. The AdBlue filler on plenty of motors rests right next to your diesel filler, occasionally under the same flap, and the two caps can look alike in poor light. It usually occurs at home, from a container grabbed on the journey home, rather than at the filling station.
The ways it takes place are few and familiar. Hurrying, outside Hazel Slade Primary Academy, after a warning lamp came on during the school run, a parent refills your car. A bottle is poured in at the end of the day on a drive just off Littleworth Road. Or someone new to that flap refills your car after dark, parked in the car park by The Trafalgar.
Rented cars, new vehicles, company motors, or the spare vehicle in a family with both fuels: the least known vehicles get it the most. Wherever in Staffordshire, Rawnsley as well, the mistake doesn't change, and neither does the first step: keep it switched off.
AdBlue in your diesel tank around Rawnsley, and the engine started?
If so, the AdBlue is no longer in your tank. Via the fuel filter, through the lines, and — given any running — on to the injection pump and every injector: that is how far it travels.
Expect lumpy running, exhaust smoke, lost power, lights on your dash, or a stall — returning from Hednesford Hills, perhaps, or part way across Rawnsley. Stop as soon as it is safe, switch off, and don't restart the car to check. Each start pulls more of it through.
Leave the M6 Toll, under 3 miles from Rawnsley, at the next junction and stop safely, not driving on.
Each mile pushes the AdBlue further into your system. That's why a hop across Rawnsley to park near Hednesford Hills Raceway and a drive of under 10 miles for Lichfield are such distinct jobs. Approximately how far had it come? Tell us.
Wherever the vehicle came to a stop is where all of it gets done, even with more to flush after the motor has been running. Lasting damage is very rare when it's spotted quickly.
Rawnsley: how AdBlue is drained from a diesel
Anywhere it has come to rest around Rawnsley — a forecourt, a lay-by, a drive, a road by St Peters — the van travels to your car. Which fluid went in, about the quantity, and if the motor has been run: our technicians check first, since those decide the job.
On the spot, your tank is then emptied, and both the polluted diesel and the urea come out as one. With AdBlue, far more than with petrol, flushing matters: the whole system is cleaned all the way through because what remains won't flush away by itself. Testing your car follows last, after fresh diesel goes in and the fuel filter is cleaned or, where necessary, swapped. Most of these jobs are a half-hour visit once our engineers turn up, if the motor has not run. The equipment is explosion-proof, so a busy filling station is no problem, and it is quiet enough for a residential street late at night.
Priming the fuel system with new diesel comes at the end. Starting it comes next, and then you set off from where the car is parked, by Hednesford or on a drive in Rawnsley. The check before our technicians leave is that it runs correctly on clean diesel. The entire job is done where the vehicle is, so it never has to go to a workshop. The insurer is likely to want an engineer's report and the VAT invoice — each handed over once the job is done.
About Rawnsley itself
Rawnsley is a village in Staffordshire, situated approximately 6 miles north of Lichfield, and is characterized by its semi-detached housing stock. Rawnsley sits in a rural area at an elevation of around 200 metres, surrounded by nearby places such as Wimblebury and Hazelslade. Rawnsley is home to a population of around 1866 residents, and is located about 114 miles northwest of London. Rawnsley remains a typical example of a small English village with a strong sense of community.
Rawnsley and Staffordshire: AdBlue drains across the area
AdBlue call-outs around Rawnsley go to teams that cover the places around it — Wimblebury, Hazelslade plus Littleworth — and most of Staffordshire further out, across WS postcodes. If you are near a boundary, or somewhere hard to describe, ring and ask rather than assuming.
No moving is needed. In Rawnsley, a rural village, a van that comes to you fits: the car is drained on the spot, be it on a driveway, a residential street, a parking area or a forecourt.
What does AdBlue in a diesel tank cost to sort out around Rawnsley?
No flat figure could be fair, since every job is different. The cost shifts first with how long, if at all, your engine has been running, and next with the amount of AdBlue that went in. After that it turns on where the vehicle is and whether a technician can get to it safely, which is simpler on an open drive than in a tight gap behind Museum of Cannock Chase.
With that in mind, every enquiry from Rawnsley begins by asking the identical trio — which fluid was put in, what quantity, if it ran — ahead of any quote. Given them, the range shrinks to one firm number.
You get that quote by phone, before anyone sets off, and you pay on the day, by card or over the phone, with nothing upfront. Look at your insurance whilst we're on the way: many carry misfuelling cover.
Next to the vehicle around Rawnsley, right now?
Leaving the vehicle alone is, right now, the most useful move you can do. Keys out; engine and ignition off. Phone 0333 366 0103 and tell us it's AdBlue, roughly how much, and if it's run. Petrol in Diesel takes it from there, in Rawnsley or anywhere across Staffordshire.