AdBlue in the Diesel Tank in Rumblingwell? Keep It Switched Off
Engine off, ignition off: that is where you begin if AdBlue has got into your diesel tank. Water with urea dissolved in it: that's AdBlue. The trouble starts once it is sucked through the pump — it won't burn, and it won't blend with diesel. If the engine has not run yet, AdBlue in a diesel tank is generally emptied and carefully rinsed where the car sits in Rumblingwell. Before you do anything else, ring 0333 366 0103.
AdBlue in your diesel tank around Rumblingwell: the first few minutes
Do these:
- Remove the keys, which prevents anyone turning the power on.
- Close to moving traffic? Then put the hazards on.
- So you can tell us which fluid it was and roughly what quantity, save your receipt or the empty bottle.
- Ring just where you are. Quote a KY12 9 postcode or the closest street sign, and no one has to search for you.
Things not to do:
- Not even briefly, and not to roll your vehicle: your motor remains off.
- Many diesels run their pump the instant your ignition comes on, so keep the car off.
- Pouring in extra diesel does not work: AdBlue settles out rather than blending.
- Any driving at all is best avoided, even a short distance up Rumblingwell.
- Don't try to drain it yourself at the kerbside.
Rolling your vehicle off the island is a job for attendants to help with, wherever Rumblingwell forecourt you are on, the Tesco included. At your own driveway, do not touch it at all.
AdBlue in a diesel tank: what it does
AdBlue is made for the exhaust, not the engine. Kept in a separate tank, it's injected into the exhaust stream to treat the gases. A fuel pump isn't made to take it, and AdBlue was never supposed to go through one.
Fuel mixes; AdBlue, once poured in, won't. Its behaviour is nothing like fuel's. Heavier than diesel, it sinks and collects underneath it — the same place the intake draws from. The first thing the system pulls through, after it runs, is the AdBlue. So a car that had AdBlue poured in on a drive in Castleblair Park last night, and has not been started since, is still the simple case: the AdBlue is lying at the bottom of your tank, and nothing has drawn it in.
Two kinds of harm follow from there. What is left once the water evaporates is urea, which forms crystals: they lodge in tiny channels and clog filters. Worse, it attacks some metals in a fuel system, and keeps going until it is flushed out. Overnight, a car parked around Rumblingwell with AdBlue through its pipework grows worse; if it is only in that tank, nothing changes. Then there is the water: it offers no lubrication to the parts that rely on it most — the high-pressure pump and each injector.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel frequently the bigger issue?
Petrol pumped into a diesel on BP's forecourt leaves your fuel watery — that is the main issue. No damage is done as long as it sits unused, blended into your diesel — only once your engine works on it.
AdBlue in a diesel is a different matter: not thin fuel, but no fuel at all. Not burning, it can't just be run through. Whether your car is in Milesmark or the heart of Rumblingwell, firing it up "to see" does more harm in this case than nearly any other slip, and the flush counts for more. The reasons: it won't remain mixed, and so watering it down is impossible; and crystals and corrosion outlast the next fill.
As with petrol, there's good news. Anywhere across Fife your vehicle has come to rest, an unstarted engine leaves the AdBlue still in the tank: the simplest part of a fuel system to empty.
How does AdBlue end up in a diesel tank around Rumblingwell?
It's not on purpose. Many cars have the AdBlue inlet alongside the diesel one, now and then under a single flap, and mixing them up is easy after dark. Usually it is never the filling station: a driver picks up a bottle heading home and tips it in outside the house.
The ways it occurs are few and familiar. Halfway through the morning drop-off, the dashboard warns, and outside the local primary school the top-up is rushed. In the evening, a bottle goes in on a drive near Parkneuk Road. Another version: darkness, a pub car park by The Rumblingwell, and a driver using that flap the first time.
It takes place most in the cars drivers know least: a hire car, a new car, a company car, or the second car of a household with one diesel and one petrol. Keep it switched off: that's the first response to the same slip, wherever in Rumblingwell or the remainder of Fife you are.
AdBlue in the diesel tank in Rumblingwell, and your engine started?
The AdBlue has left your tank, then. The fuel filter and pipework have had it pulled along, and any running time takes it on to the injection pump and each injector.
Rough running, smoke, dropping power, dashboard warnings or cutting out: any may show up, perhaps part way across Rumblingwell or coming back from Bull Park. Stop as soon as it is safe, switch off, and do not restart the vehicle to check. More of it is pulled through with each start.
Rumblingwell sits under 3 miles from the A823(M); if you were on it, exit by the next junction and pull up somewhere safe rather than carrying on.
A quick hop across Rumblingwell to the car park by Baldridgeburn Community Centre is one thing; driving towards Dunfermline, under a mile away, is something else, because every mile carries the AdBlue deeper in. So distance matters. Roughly how far had it come? Tell us.
We do all of the cleaning where the vehicle has ended up, and once the motor has been started there is more of it. Very rarely does it leave permanent damage if it's caught quickly.
What clearing AdBlue from a diesel involves around Rumblingwell
Our engineers come to your car, wherever it has stopped in Rumblingwell: a side street close to The Limelight Studio, a drive, a lay-by or a forecourt. Which fluid got in, about the quantity, plus if the engine has turned over: our engineers check first, since those decide the work.
Then that tank is emptied where your car sits, and so the contaminated fuel and the AdBlue come out together. What remains from AdBlue won't flush away by itself, so the whole system gets a full flush, which counts much more with urea than for petrol. After that, your filter: flushed, or changed when it has to be. After that clean diesel, and then a test of the vehicle. Roughly half an hour on site is typical for most jobs where the engine hasn't run. Quiet enough to use outside a house at night, and safe on a working forecourt, our pumps are explosion-proof.
The final step is to prime the system on clean diesel. After that we fire it up and you set off, whether from a parking bay outside Dunfermline City or a driveway in Rumblingwell. Our engineers check it runs smoothly on clean diesel before leaving. We do it all wherever the vehicle has stopped, and it never needs to be taken to a workshop. Insurers ask for a VAT invoice and an engineer report, and you get both at the end.
About Rumblingwell
Rumblingwell is a suburban area situated on the outskirts of Dunfermline in Fife, Scotland, with a mix of flat housing and local amenities. Rumblingwell sits at an elevation of 103 metres, close to the coastal landscape of the Firth of Forth. Rumblingwell is part of the wider Dunfermline urban area, which includes nearby places such as Baldridgeburn and Parkneuk. Rumblingwell has a population of around 3111 people, with many residents commuting to nearby towns and cities.
AdBlue drains across Fife, Rumblingwell included
The teams that answer AdBlue jobs in Rumblingwell also cover the spots around it, Baldridgeburn, Parkneuk and Beveridgewell among them, and most of Fife beyond, across the KY postcode area. Ring and ask rather than guess when you are by a county line, or somewhere awkward to explain.
Anywhere the vehicle stands — your drive at home, a residential street, a car park, a forecourt — our technicians empty it on the spot, and there's no need to take it to us; which suits Rumblingwell, a residential suburb, well.
Rumblingwell: what AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to fix
Not one single price would be fair, because each job is different. Whether the engine has been running, and for how long, comes first in what shifts the cost. How much AdBlue went in comes next, and then the location of the car, since an open drive is simpler for a technician to get to safely than a tight spot behind 2nd Fife Scout Group.
For that in mind, each call from Rumblingwell begins with the same trio — what got in, what quantity, whether it ran — ahead of any figure. Their answers shrink the range down to one figure.
Our quote is given on the call, before a van sets off; settling up happens on the day, by card or over the phone, and nothing upfront. While the van is travelling, check your insurance: plenty cover misfuelling.
In Rumblingwell and still beside the vehicle?
Not touching the car is, then, the best thing open to you. Ignition off, engine off, keys out. Call 0333 366 0103 then tell us it's AdBlue, roughly how much, and if it's run. Petrol in Diesel takes it from there, in Rumblingwell or anywhere across Fife.