AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Royston: How It Happens and How to Prevent It
Pause reading for a moment if the diesel tank already holds AdBlue in it: ignition off, engine off, and phone 0333 366 0103. A drain plus a thorough flush, carried out just where your vehicle stands around Royston, is normally what it takes if found before your engine runs. Here in advance? In that case what follows covers why it comes about and what to stop it happening at all.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel car
Plenty of newer diesels on the roads round Royston and Felkirk carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to the engine. Its own tank keeps it, and from there it is sent to the exhaust, and there spraying treats the fumes.
Different tanks, different fillers. Under one flap, side by side: that's the arrangement on many cars. Elsewhere, AdBlue's filler is beneath the bonnet or in your boot instead. Topping up the diesel side at the petrol pump happens all the time. A driver 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.
AdBlue in the diesel tank around Royston: how it occurs
Rarely is it carelessness: normally three things coincide.
First, the warning. Low AdBlue triggers a warning from the vehicle, and letting it run out leads to limp mode — so a hurried top-up, perhaps before work off High Street, or at The Pack Horse on the way home after work.
Then the car is unfamiliar. A hire car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers where your last one did not, and your hand hits for the cap it would have used on the old one.
Nothing halts the pour once it has started, since a bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one. The bottle fits. Carlton or the heart of Royston: it is the same few seconds in both.
The AdBlue filler and the diesel filler: telling them apart
Look at these first, on a forecourt around Royston or a driveway out in Athersley South. Seconds, that's all.
- Where it sits misleads; the cap doesn't. AdBlue ones tend to be blue or bear the word "AdBlue" — diesel ones usually do not.
- Look at the size: the smaller filler neck is, on plenty of motors, the AdBlue one.
- A label inside the fuel flap frequently says which fuel goes where, on many cars. Look for it.
- The handbook says where it is if your filler is not next to the diesel cap: your boot, or under the bonnet.
- Whoever had it before will know. Check when you collect a rental or company car — from Barnsley's car park, perhaps — rather than when the warning comes on.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching the diesel tank
When the light goes on, wherever around South Yorkshire, use this routine.
- Not in a rush on the side of Church Street, not on a slope, not with your engine running: park then switch off first.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, after you find the AdBlue filler and reading it. Daft, yes, but it does the trick.
- The two behind one flap? So make sure the lid on your diesel side is still shut ahead of raising the bottle.
- Using the bottle's own spout, pour slowly — and stop when it is full or the bottle is empty.
- Close the cap, and check again — making sure your diesel filler stayed shut throughout. Only then, start the vehicle.
Find at step two or three that it has already gone into your diesel side? So stop just there. Do not go on to stage five.
Royston: already put AdBlue in the diesel tank?
The short order of things, starting with not starting the motor. On many diesels your ignition alone runs the fuel pump, so don't switch it on. Don't top up with diesel to thin it: AdBlue doesn't mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of the tank, where your fuel is sucked from.
If you're on a forecourt, whether it's the JET or the The Co-operative, ask the attendants to help roll the vehicle clear of the petrol pump. At home around Royston? So the car remains put.
If your engine has already run, stop as soon as it is safe then switch off. Royston lies under 5 miles from the M1; on it, take the first exit. A short hop across Royston is a smaller job than a run towards Wakefield, under 10 miles away, so tell us roughly how far it went.
What occurs when we get there around Royston
Outside Parkside Primary Academy, near Bethel Community Church or on your own driveway: wherever your car has stopped, our engineers come to it. Those answers decide this work and our price, and so our technicians ask what was put in, about how much, and whether it's run. On the call itself, you hear our price — before anything else.
Then that tank is cleared and the fuel system rinsed thoroughly. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, and so it does not wash out on its own — which is why that matters more with AdBlue than with petrol. The filter flushed or, where it must be, swapped; fresh diesel in; and then a test of your vehicle. After that we fire it up and make sure it runs properly before we leave.
If your motor has not run, the majority of jobs take about half an hour once we are there, using pumps that are safe on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark. Payment is on the day, not upfront, and you receive the paperwork an insurer asks for: an engineer's report and a VAT invoice. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it's worth checking yours whilst we are on the way.
About Royston itself
Royston is a town in South Yorkshire, situated approximately 6 miles from Wakefield and 155 miles from London, with a population of around 12822 people. Royston sits at an elevation of 71 metres, characterised by its predominantly semi-detached housing stock. Royston is located near several smaller communities, including Carlton, Notton, and Athersley North, in the inland area of South Yorkshire.
Royston and South Yorkshire: AdBlue drains across the area
Notton and Athersley North are among the places near Royston, a town, that the same vans cover, over S postcodes. The van reaches you fastest with a postcode starting S71 4.
The vehicle stays where it is. Anywhere it sits — beside Bethel Community Centre, on a layby en route to Royston Park, at home — that is where it gets drained. Ring and ask instead of guessing if you are near a boundary, or somewhere hard to explain, like the back of Royston Library.
In short, for Royston drivers
Pour nothing until you've read the cap. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it stands, anywhere around South Yorkshire, if AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank anyway — so leave the vehicle off and call 0333 366 0103.