Preventing AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Sandiway: Why It Happens
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave your motor and the ignition off and phone 0333 366 0103. A drain and a full flush, carried out right where your vehicle stands in Sandiway, is usually what it needs when caught before the motor runs. The remainder of this page explains why it occurs and how to make sure it does not — useful if you are reading ahead of time.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle, and its separate tank
Diesel feeds the motor — yet many modern diesels seen about Sandiway and Crabtree Green carry another fluid too. Its own tank holds it, and from there it goes to your exhaust, and there a spray cleans the gas.
Each tank has its own filler. Under one flap, side by side: that's the layout on many motors. Elsewhere, AdBlue's filler is beneath the bonnet or in your boot instead. The diesel side is fuelled at the petrol pump all the time. A driver who has to stop and think where it goes normally tops up the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and much less commonly. That gap is where the error lives.
Sandiway: how AdBlue in the diesel tank happens
Three things tend to line up, and carelessness is seldom one of them.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low your car tells you, and if it runs out altogether, the car goes into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a drive off Weaverham Road before work, or in the car park at The Blue Cap on the way home.
Then, the hand goes for the cap it would have used on the old car — since a rental car, a new motor or a company car puts the fillers somewhere your last one did not.
Third, the spout fits: diesel filler or AdBlue filler, it slides in just as readily, and once the pour starts, no part halts it. Whether it takes place in Cuddington or the middle of Sandiway, it's the same few seconds.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
A couple of seconds is all the checks take — so check them before you tip anything, on a driveway in Nova Scotia or a forecourt around Sandiway.
- Check the cap rather than going by where it sits: AdBlue caps are frequently blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel caps usually aren't.
- Check the size: the smaller filler neck is, on many vehicles, the AdBlue one.
- The flap. Look inside the fuel flap for a label. Plenty of vehicles say there which fuel goes where.
- The handbook. If your filler is not by your diesel cap, it's in your boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- The previous driver knows. Ask when you collect a rental or fleet car — at Cuddington's car park, say — not once the light appears.
How to top up without AdBlue in your diesel tank
Wherever across Cheshire the light comes on, here is a routine for that day.
- Park and switch off. Not on a slope, not with your motor running, and not in a rush on the side of Mere Lane.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds silly and it does the trick.
- Both under a single flap? Then confirm the lid on the diesel filler is still closed ahead of lifting the bottle.
- Tip slowly, using the bottle's own spout. Stop when it's full or when the bottle is empty.
- Before you start the vehicle, shut the cap and check again that your diesel cap never came off.
Find at stage two or three that it has already gone into the diesel side? So stop right there. Don't go on to stage five.
Put AdBlue in your diesel tank around Sandiway already?
The short order of things, beginning with not starting the engine. Do not switch your ignition on; on plenty of diesels that alone runs the fuel pump. AdBlue does not mix with diesel — it sinks to the bottom of that tank, where your fuel is sucked from — so do not top up with diesel to thin it.
On a forecourt — Shell, another forecourt nearby or another — the attendants will normally help push the car clear, if you ask. If you are on your own driveway in Sandiway, leave the car where it is.
Stop as soon as it is safe then switch off, if the engine has already run. Sandiway lies under 10 miles from the M56; on it, use the first junction. Roughly how far did it go? Hopping across Sandiway is less work than a run of under 15 miles to Chester, so say.
What happens when we get there around Sandiway
The van reaches the car wherever it has come to rest — your own driveway, beside Sandiway Full Gospel Church, or by Sandiway Primary School. Both the work and the price rest on three replies — which liquid, what amount, and whether it's run — so we ask. On the call itself, you hear our price — ahead of anything else.
Emptying that tank comes next, then a thorough flush of the fuel system. With AdBlue that counts more than with petrol: it crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it doesn't wash out on its own. Testing is last: before that, fresh diesel goes in, and the filter is flushed or replaced as needed. The motor is fired up next and tested to make sure it runs correctly, all before our technicians go.
If the motor has not run, the majority of jobs take about half an hour once we are there, using pumps that are safe on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night. Your insurer will ask for the engineer's report and your VAT invoice, and you get both once this job is done. Payment is on the day, with no deposit. Before we get there, have a look at your policy; many carry cover for misfuelling.
About Sandiway, for a moment
Sandiway is a village in Cheshire, situated inland at an elevation of 76 metres, approximately 12.6 miles from Chester. Sandiway has a population of around 1923 people, with predominantly detached housing. Sandiway is close to nearby places such as Cuddington, Daleford, and Gorstage, and is located in the North West region of England, about 158.2 miles from London.
AdBlue drains about Sandiway, and Cheshire beyond
Over CW postcodes, the vans covering Sandiway — a rural village — work the surrounding spots too, Gorstage and Daleford among them. A postcode starting CW8 2 gets the van to you fastest.
Shifting the car is not necessary. Draining takes place on the spot, be it a driveway, a street near Sandiway Methodist Church, or a lay-by on the way to Cartledge Moss. Awkward to pin down, like the back of Sandiway Lodge? Close to a county line? Asking beats assuming, and so ring.
In short, for Sandiway drivers
Always, the cap; after that, the pour. Petrol in Diesel empties it where it stands, anywhere in Cheshire, if AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank all the same — so leave the vehicle off and phone 0333 366 0103.