AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Rosedale: How It Occurs and How to Avoid It
Pause reading a minute if the diesel tank already holds AdBlue in it: ignition off, motor off, and ring 0333 366 0103. Around Rosedale, catching it before your motor turns usually means draining and a thorough flush on the spot. If you are reading before it has happened, the remainder of this page is about why it happens and how to make sure it does not.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel motor
Diesel feeds the engine — yet many current diesels driven about Rosedale and Bury Green carry a second liquid too. Kept in a tank of its own, AdBlue is fed into your exhaust stream and cleans it.
Each tank has its own filler. Other vehicles put the AdBlue filler in the boot or under the bonnet; plenty of others have the two together behind one flap. The diesel side is filled at the pump all the time. Someone who has to stop and work out where it goes usually tops up the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and much less frequently. That gap is where the mistake lives.
How does AdBlue in the diesel tank occur in Rosedale?
Seldom is it carelessness: normally three things line up.
Haste comes from the warning. The vehicle warns you as AdBlue runs low, and an empty tank puts the vehicle into limp mode — so the top-up happens quickly, before work on a driveway off Valence Drive, or on the way home in the car park outside The Plough.
Next, your hand goes for the cap it knew on the old car — since a hire car, a new motor or a company car puts the fillers somewhere your last one didn't.
Lastly, the spout goes in: a diesel filler or AdBlue filler, it slides in as easily, and after the pour starts, no part halts it. The same few seconds settle it, in the middle of Rosedale or out in Flamstead End.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Be it a Rosedale forecourt or a driveway out in Lucas End, spend a few seconds on these before any is poured in.
- Blue and marking: an AdBlue cap is often blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap normally does not. Trust the cap, not its position.
- Many cars fit AdBlue the smaller neck of the two.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Many vehicles say there which fuel goes where.
- Can't find it beside your diesel filler? In that case look below the bonnet or in the boot — the handbook says which.
- Ask the person who drove it last — before you leave, not when the light comes on — if you collect a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park at Cheshunt.
How to top up without AdBlue in your diesel tank
Anywhere across Hertfordshire the light comes on, here is a routine for that day.
- Stop on level, engine off, with time in hand — never hurried on the side of Granby Park Road.
- Locate the AdBlue filler, read the cap, and say the name "AdBlue" out loud as unscrewing it. It seems daft. It works.
- If both sit under one flap, check the diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — then leave it on.
- Slowly is best, through the bottle's own spout, until it is full or the bottle is empty.
- Shut the cap, then look again — making sure the diesel cap remained closed the whole time. Only then, start the vehicle.
Find during the second or third stage that AdBlue went in the diesel filler? That's where you stop. Never go on to stage five.
AdBlue in your diesel tank already, around Rosedale?
Then the order of things is short. Do not start your motor. The fuel pump starts on plenty of diesels as soon as your ignition goes on — and so keep it off. Thinning it with extra diesel fails, because AdBlue settles to the bottom rather than mixing — and that is where your fuel is drawn from.
Ask the attendants to help push your car away from the petrol pump if you're at a forecourt — the Shell, the BP or somewhere else. Leave it where it is if you are on your own drive in Rosedale.
Where your engine has run by now, pull over somewhere safe then switch it off. Rosedale sits under 3 miles from the M25; there, take the next junction. Tell us roughly how far it went: a run towards St Albans, under 15 miles away, is a bigger job than a short hop across Rosedale.
When we get there around Rosedale, what happens?
Our van comes to the car wherever it has come to rest — your own driveway, near Rosedale Community Church, or by Fairfields Primary School and Nursery. Our engineers ask what got in, about how much, and whether it's run, since those replies determine this work and our price. Nobody sets off until you have heard our quote by phone.
Then that tank is drained and the fuel system rinsed thoroughly. Not like petrol, AdBlue leaves crystals and attacks some fuel-system metals, and none of it washes away unaided. Hence it counts more. Filter flushed or, if it must be, replaced; fresh diesel in; and then a test of your vehicle. Before we go, we start the car and make sure that it's running smoothly.
Using pumps fine on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night, most jobs in which the motor hasn't run take roughly half an hour once our engineers are there. No money in advance; you settle up that day. Afterwards, a VAT invoice and a report from the engineer are handed to you for your insurer. While we travel, take a look at your policy; many include cover for misfuelling.
About Rosedale and where it is
Rosedale is a suburban area in Hertfordshire, situated near the River Colne and close to the M25 motorway. Rosedale sits at an elevation of 46 metres, with its riverside setting influencing the local environment. Rosedale is located near several other suburban areas, including Flamstead End and Churchgate, and is within commuting distance of London, being approximately 14.5 miles from the city centre.
AdBlue drains around Rosedale and across Hertfordshire
As a residential suburb, Rosedale shares its vans nearby areas — Churchgate, Hammond Street — right across EN postcodes and the surrounding area around them. A postcode starting EN7 6 gets our van to you fastest.
The vehicle doesn't need to move. Our technicians drain it where it is — a side street close to Flamstead End Hall, a lay-by on the way to Cheshunt Park, a driveway. Awkward to pin down, like the back of Timeline Ampitheatre? By a border? Checking beats assuming, and so phone.
Rosedale drivers: the short version
First, the cap; then, the tip. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank all the same, leave it off then ring 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel clears it where it stands, anywhere around Hertfordshire.