Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Ridley
If AdBlue has gone into the diesel tank, keep the motor off then leave your ignition off. In plain terms, AdBlue is simply urea in water. Unlike fuel, it neither burns nor blends, and no harm starts till the engine sucks it round. In Ridley, AdBlue in a diesel tank caught before the motor runs usually comes down to a drain and a thorough flush, right where your car is. Ring 0333 366 0103 before you do anything else.
What to do right now, Ridley: AdBlue in the diesel tank
To do:
- Keys out — then no one can switch anything on.
- Hazards on, if moving traffic is at all close.
- The empty bottle or the receipt tells us the fluid and the amount, so do not throw it away.
- The van finds you fastest with a postcode starting TN15 7, or simply the name of a street nearby, so call from the car.
Never do these:
- Shifting your vehicle just a few yards is no reason to start your engine.
- Turning the key to ignition alone starts the pump going on many diesels. Avoid it.
- No more fuel added. The AdBlue will not mix, and so it's pointless.
- Even a short stretch along Rectory Road is too far to drive the car.
- Emptying that tank yourself beside the road is not worth trying.
Ask the people behind the counter to help you roll the car away from the pumps if you're on a forecourt in Ridley, whether it's the Gulf or somewhere else. At your own drive, do not touch it at all.
AdBlue in a diesel tank: what it does
AdBlue is made for your exhaust, not your motor. It goes into its own tank and is sprayed into the exhaust gas to fresh it. No part in an injection pump is made for this fluid — and none of that was intended to go that way.
Inside a diesel tank it behaves very differently from fuel. It doesn't mix in. Denser than diesel, it sinks and pools underneath it — the very spot the intake sucks from. Easiest of all: one that got AdBlue in Ash overnight and hasn't been started since. The AdBlue sits at the foot of the tank, undrawn — though it would be the first thing through once the motor starts, before any diesel at all.
Two kinds of damage come 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 labouring on the components it gets to for as long as it remains there. Overnight, a vehicle sitting in Ridley with AdBlue through its pipework grows worse; if it's only in that tank, it doesn't. Diesel protects the high-pressure pump and each injector as it flows; water offers no lubrication, and that is a second kind of harm.
Why AdBlue in a diesel is regularly more major than petrol
A fault of thin fuel is what you get after filling a diesel with petrol from the Texaco. It mixes with the diesel, and while it's inside the tank it causes no harm; the harm comes from running the motor on it.
AdBlue in a diesel is a fault of the wrong substance altogether. Not burning, it can't just be run through. Whether the car is in South Street or the heart of Ridley, firing it up "to see" costs more in this case than almost any other error, and the flush counts more. Why: it won't remain mixed, so diluting it fails; and deposits and corrosion outlast the next fill.
As with petrol, there's good news. Never run? Then the AdBlue waits only inside the tank, the easiest bit of the entire system to clear, anywhere the vehicle has stopped around Kent.
How AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank around Ridley
Many vehicles put the AdBlue cap beside the diesel cap, occasionally behind a single flap, and in dim light the two can appear identical. No one intends it. Mostly it occurs with a bottle bought on the way home and poured in on the drive, not at the pump.
The ways it takes place are few and familiar. Hurrying, outside Culverstone Green Primary School, after a warning lamp came on during the school run, a parent refills the car. In the evening, a container goes in on a drive near Ridley Hill. Or the vehicle is topped up in the car park outside the pub in the village, in poor light, by someone who has never opened that flap before.
It happens most in the cars people know least: a hire car, a new car, a company car, or the second car of a household with one diesel and one petrol. Wherever you are around Ridley or the rest of Kent, it's the same error and the same first answer: leave the car off.
Already started your engine with AdBlue in your diesel tank around Ridley?
The AdBlue has left the tank, then. Via the filter, through the pipework, and — with any running time — on to the high-pressure pump and each injector: that is where it travels.
Perhaps returning from New Ash Green Sports Club, or part way across Ridley, your motor might run lumpy, smoke, drop power, light up your dash or stall. Stop when safe. Switch off. Keep the car off rather than testing it again. Each start pulls more of that through.
On the M20, under 3 miles from Ridley, the next junction is where to leave, and somewhere safe is where to stop — not driving on.
Each mile carries the AdBlue deeper in. That is why a hop across Ridley to park beside St Peter and a drive of under 25 miles towards London are very separate jobs. Tell us about how far it had come.
Wherever your car came to a stop is where all of it gets done, even with more to rinse out after the engine has been started. Spotted early, it very seldom leaves long-term damage.
Ridley: how AdBlue is drained from a diesel
The car stays put, whether that is a street beside Hodsoll Street and Ridley Village Hall, a driveway, a lay-by or a forecourt in Ridley, and our van comes to it. Before anything else our engineers ask what got in, about how much, and if your engine has run, because those replies determine this work.
Then the tank is cleared where your car waits, so the tainted fuel and the AdBlue come out together. A full flush matters far more with AdBlue than with petrol, since residue will not clear away on its own. Next, the filter: cleaned, or replaced when it has to be. Then fresh diesel, then a check of your car. The majority of these jobs are a half-hour visit once our technicians turn up, if the engine has not run. The pumps are explosion-proof, safe on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark.
Priming the system with fresh diesel comes at the end. Starting it comes next, and then you set off from where your car is parked, outside Meopham or on a drive around Ridley. We confirm it runs smoothly on new diesel before we go. The entire job is done where your car is, so it never needs to go to a workshop. Your insurer is likely to want an engineer's report and the VAT invoice — both yours once the job is done.
About Ridley, for a moment
Ridley is a small hamlet in Kent, situated inland at an elevation of 157 metres, and is located approximately 22 miles from London. Ridley sits near the communities of Pettings, New Street, and Hodsoll Street, and is characterized by its predominantly detached housing stock. Ridley remains a quiet residential area with a population of around 522 people.
AdBlue drains across Ridley and Kent
Our teams that answer AdBlue calls in Ridley also cover the locations round it, Pettings, New Street and Hodsoll Street among them, and most of Kent beyond, across the TN postcode area. Close to a boundary, or somewhere tricky to pin down? Asking is better than guessing, so ring.
Anywhere your car sits — a driveway at home, a residential street, a parking area, a filling station — our engineers empty it there, and there's no need to take it to us; which suits Ridley, a rural hamlet, well.
AdBlue in a diesel tank around Ridley: the cost of fixing it
Not one flat price would be fair, since each job is different. What moves the cost is, firstly, whether the motor has run and for how long; then how much AdBlue went in; and then where the car is and whether our van can reach it safely, which is simpler on an open driveway than in a tight space behind Parish Church of St Peter and St Paul.
With that in mind, each call from Ridley opens with the identical trio — what was put in, what quantity, if it ran — before a quote. When those are known, a range turns into a single firm figure.
The price is quoted during the call, before a van leaves; settling up comes on the day, by card or over the phone, with nothing upfront. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it's worth checking yours whilst we're on the way.
In Ridley and still beside the vehicle?
In that case, do nothing — that's the best move available. Keys out, motor off, ignition off. Say it was AdBlue, about how big an amount, and whether it ran, on 0333 366 0103. After that Petrol in Diesel takes over, across Ridley or anywhere within Kent.