Why It Happens and How to Avoid It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Rectory Farm
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave your motor and the ignition off then ring 0333 366 0103. A drain plus a thorough flush, carried out just where the vehicle stands around Rectory Farm, is normally what it takes when found before your motor runs. Here before the event? In that case the rest explains why it happens and what to stop it happening at all.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel vehicle need its own filler?
Many newer diesels on the roads around Rectory Farm and Great Billing carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to the engine. Its own tank holds it, and from there it goes to the exhaust, where spraying cleans the fumes.
Each tank has its own filler. Many of vehicles have a single flap for both, whereas others move the AdBlue filler to the boot or under the bonnet. At the petrol pump, the diesel side is topped up constantly. Seldom topped up, AdBlue usually comes out of a bottle, poured by a driver who has to stop and think what filler to use. That gap is where the mistake lives.
AdBlue in the diesel tank in Rectory Farm: how it happens
It is hardly ever carelessness. Three things tend to line up.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low the car tells you, and if it runs out completely, your vehicle goes into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a driveway off Olden Road before work, or in the car park at The Worlds End on the way home.
Then, your hand goes for the cap it knew on the old vehicle — since a hire car, a new motor or a company car places the fillers where your last one did not.
No part stops the pour after it has started, because a bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as readily as an AdBlue one. The bottle fits. The same few seconds decide it, in the middle of Rectory Farm or out in Overstone Lodge.
Telling the AdBlue filler from your diesel filler
Whether a Rectory Farm forecourt or a driveway out in Goldings, take a couple of seconds on these before anything goes in.
- Read the cap instead of going by position: AdBlue ones are frequently blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel caps normally are not.
- The size. On plenty of vehicles the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- The flap. Look inside the fuel flap for a label. Plenty of motors say there which fuel goes where.
- The handbook. If the filler isn't by the diesel cap, it is in the boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- Picking up a hire or company car, say at the car park outside Northampton? Check with the person who drove the car last before you set off, not once the light comes on.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching your diesel tank
When the light comes on, wherever around Northamptonshire, use this routine.
- Not in a rush on the side of Winnington Close, not on a slope, not with your motor running: park and switch off first.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds daft and it does the trick.
- The diesel cap stays on. Where the two sit under a flap, confirm it's closed before the bottle comes up.
- Stop once your tank is topped up or the bottle runs dry; until then, pour slowly using its built-in spout.
- Shut the cap, and look once more — making sure the diesel filler remained shut throughout. After that, start the vehicle.
Stop there if you find, at step two or three, that you have already poured into your diesel side. Don't go on to stage five.
Already put AdBlue in the diesel tank in Rectory Farm?
What follows is a short order of things, starting with not starting the motor. The fuel pump starts on plenty of diesels as soon as the ignition is switched on — so leave it off. AdBlue does not mix with diesel — it sinks to the bottom of that tank, where your fuel is sucked from — so do not top up with diesel to dilute it.
On a forecourt — Esso, Tesco or another — the staff will usually help push the vehicle away, when you ask. Your own drive in Rectory Farm is the place it stays.
If your motor has already run, stop as soon as it is safe then switch off. On the M1, under 10 miles from Rectory Farm, that means the next exit. Mileage matters — a quick hop across Rectory Farm is a smaller job than heading under 25 miles towards Milton Keynes — so say roughly how far it went.
Rectory Farm: what happens when we arrive
We come to the vehicle wherever it has stopped, whether that's outside Rectory Farm Primary School, close to Rectory Farm Community Centre or on your own drive. Our engineers ask what went in, roughly how much, and if it has run, because those replies settle this work and our price. No one heads out before you've heard the price by phone.
The fuel system is then flushed thoroughly, once your tank is emptied. 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 with AdBlue than with petrol. The filter cleaned or, where needed, swapped; clean diesel in; then a check of your car. We do not go until it has been fired up and is running smoothly.
With pumps safe on a busy forecourt and quiet enough for use outside a house at night, most jobs where your motor has not run take about half an hour once we are there. No money in advance; you settle up that day. At the end, a VAT invoice and the report from the engineer are handed to you for your insurer. It's worth checking your insurance as the van travels to you: misfuelling cover comes with many policies.
About Rectory Farm itself
Rectory Farm is a suburban area in Northamptonshire, situated inland at an elevation of around 91 metres. Rectory Farm lies approximately 15.8 miles from Milton Keynes and 60.1 miles from London, placing it within commuting distance of major urban centres. Rectory Farm is characterized by its predominantly terraced housing stock, with nearby places including Overstone Lodge, Ecton Brook, and Blackthorn.
AdBlue drains across Northamptonshire, Rectory Farm included
Throughout NN postcodes, the vans covering Rectory Farm — a residential suburb — work the nearby places too, Blackthorn and Ecton Brook included. A postcode starting NN3 5 gets our van to you fastest.
There's no need to move the vehicle. A drive, a lay-by on the way to Rectory Farm Linear Park, a side street close to Arlbury road Community Hub: we drain the car where it stands. Ring and ask instead of guessing if you are close to a boundary, or somewhere hard to explain, like the back of Ecton Wesleyan Methodist Chapel.
For Rectory Farm motorists, the short version
Read the cap before you pour. Even so AdBlue in the diesel tank? Petrol in Diesel can drain it where it stands, anywhere around Northamptonshire: keep the vehicle off then call 0333 366 0103.