AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Rushton: How It Occurs and How to Stop It
Leave the motor and ignition off and ring 0333 366 0103 first — reading can wait when AdBlue is already in the diesel tank. Caught before your motor runs, it's generally a drain and a thorough flush, done where your car is around Rushton. If you're reading before it has happened, the remainder of this page is about why it takes place and how to make sure it doesn't.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle, and its separate tank
Diesel feeds the motor — but many current diesels driven round Rushton and Rhuddall Heath hold another fluid too. AdBlue goes to your exhaust, where it is sprayed into the gas to fresh it, and it lives in a tank of its own.
Each tank comes with one filler of its own. Some motors put the AdBlue filler in the boot or under the bonnet; a lot of others have the two side by side behind one flap. The diesel side is filled at the petrol pump all the time. Rarely filled, AdBlue normally goes in out of a bottle, tipped by someone who must stop and think what filler to use. The error lives in that gap.
Rushton: how AdBlue in the diesel tank happens
Carelessness rarely explains it. Instead is three things lining up together.
Haste follows from the warning. The vehicle warns you as AdBlue runs low, and a dry tank puts the vehicle into limp mode — so the top-up happens quickly, before work on a drive off Moss Hall Lane, or heading home in the car park outside the pub in the village.
Then the car is unfamiliar. A hire car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't, and the hand hits for the cap it would have used on the old one.
Third, the bottle goes in: diesel filler or AdBlue one, it goes in just as readily, and after the tip begins, no part halts it. The same few seconds decide it, in the middle of Rushton or out in Eaton.
Which filler is for AdBlue, and which for diesel?
A few seconds is all these take — so check them before you pour anything, on a driveway in Tarporley or a forecourt around Rushton.
- Position misleads; the cap does not. AdBlue ones tend to be blue or bear the word "AdBlue" — diesel ones normally do not.
- On many vehicles, the size tells: AdBlue has the smaller filler neck.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Plenty of vehicles say there which fuel goes where.
- The handbook. If the filler isn't by the diesel cap, it is in your boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- Picking up a hire or company car, say at the car park at Delamere? Check with whoever drove the car last before you set off, rather than when the light comes on.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching the diesel tank
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever around Cheshire that is.
- Not in a rush on the side of Dogmore Lane, 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.
- Leave the diesel cap on. If both sit under one flap, check the diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle.
- Gently is best, through the bottle's own spout, till it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Before starting your car, shut the cap and look again that your diesel cap was never opened off.
Discover during the second or third stage that the bottle went into the wrong filler? That's where you stop. Don't go on to stage five.
Already put AdBlue in the diesel tank in Rushton?
Don't start your engine: that is where the short order of things starts. On many diesels the ignition alone runs the fuel pump, and so don't switch the vehicle on. AdBlue doesn't mix with diesel — it sinks to the bottom of the tank, where the fuel is pulled from — so don't top up with diesel to thin it.
The staff at Murco, Texaco or any forecourt will normally lend a hand to push the car clear when you ask. On your own drive around Rushton? So the car remains where it is.
Stop as soon as it is safe then switch off, if your motor has already run. On the M56, under 10 miles from Rushton, that means the next exit. About how far did it go? Crossing Rushton is less work than a trip of under 15 miles to Chester, so say.
What takes place when our engineers turn up in Rushton
By Eaton Primary School, near Oulton Park Circuit or on your own driveway: wherever your car has stopped, our engineers come to it. Our technicians ask what went in, roughly how much, and whether it's run, because those replies settle the work and our quote. You get that quote on the phone, before anyone heads out.
Next: draining, then a full flush of the entire system. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, and so it doesn't wash out on its own — which is why the flush counts more here than with petrol. Once your filter has been cleaned — or renewed, where needed — fresh diesel goes in, and then the vehicle is tested. After that our engineers fire it up and confirm it runs smoothly before leaving.
Most jobs are finished in about half an hour once we get there, as long as the motor hasn't run — and the pumps our technicians use are safe on a live forecourt and quiet at night beside a house. Your insurer usually wants an engineer's report and the VAT invoice, and you get both at the end. Payment is on the day, with no deposit. It is worth looking at your policy as the van travels to you: misfuelling cover comes with many policies.
About Rushton and where it is
Rushton is a small hamlet in Cheshire, situated inland at an elevation of 68 metres, approximately 11 miles from Chester. Rushton lies near the villages of Eaton, Little Budworth, and Cotebrook, and is characterized by its predominantly detached housing stock. Rushton remains a quiet residential community, with a population of around 538 people. Rushton is located in the North West region of England, about 155 miles from London.
AdBlue drains about Rushton, and Cheshire beyond
As a rural hamlet, Rushton shares its vans surrounding areas — Little Budworth, Cotebrook — all the way across CW postcodes and the wider area beyond. A postcode starting CW6 9 gets the van to you fastest.
Your car stays where it is. Wherever it sits — near St Thomas, in a lay-by heading to Hunt's Gorse, on a drive — that is where it is emptied. If you are close to a boundary, or somewhere hard to describe like the back of Village Cross, ring and ask instead of guessing.
Rushton motorists: the short version
First, the cap; after that, the pour. Still AdBlue in your diesel tank? Petrol in Diesel can empty it where it is, wherever around Cheshire: keep the car off then phone 0333 366 0103.