How It Occurs and How to Prevent It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Sheuchan Parks
AdBlue already in the diesel tank? Then set this page aside for now, keep your ignition and engine off, then call 0333 366 0103. Normally, when the engine hasn't turned, it is drained and fully cleaned where your vehicle is around Sheuchan Parks. 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
Many modern diesels around Dicks Hill, like those in Sheuchan Parks, run on two liquids; your motor takes only your diesel. Stored in a tank of its own, AdBlue is fed into the exhaust stream to clean it.
There's a filler on every tank. Other cars keep the AdBlue filler in your boot or under the bonnet; plenty more have both together under one flap. At the pump, your diesel side is topped up 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 far less commonly. That gap is where the error lives.
Sheuchan Parks: how AdBlue in your diesel tank occurs
Three things tend to come together, and carelessness is seldom one of them.
On a driveway off Seabank Road before work, or in the car park outside Commercial Inn on the way home: that is where the hurried top-up happens. What is the reason for the rush? As AdBlue gets low the car warns you, and if it is gone, limp mode kicks in.
The old car's cap is where the hand goes — yet a hire car, a new vehicle or a company car keeps the fillers elsewhere. That is a second factor: a strange car.
And the bottle fits. A bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one, and so nothing stops the pour once it has started. It takes a few seconds, whether in West End or right in the heart of Sheuchan Parks.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Before you pour anything, whether on a driveway in Ochtrelure or a forecourt around Sheuchan Parks, check these. They take a couple of seconds.
- Check the cap rather than going by where it sits: AdBlue caps are often blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel ones usually aren't.
- On plenty of motors, size tells: AdBlue gets the smaller filler neck.
- Look inside your fuel flap: plenty of vehicles have a label there saying which fuel goes where.
- In the boot or under the bonnet: that's where the filler is if it is not by the diesel cap, and the handbook tells you which.
- The person who drove it last. On a hire or company car collected from somewhere like the car park outside Stranraer, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
How to top up without AdBlue in your diesel tank
Wherever across Dumfries and Galloway the light comes on, here is a routine for the day.
- Park then switch off. Not on a slope, not with your motor running, and not in a rush on the side of Dalriada Avenue.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds silly and it does the trick.
- The diesel cap remains on. When both sit under a flap, confirm it is shut before lifting the bottle.
- Slowly does it, through the bottle's own spout, until it's full or the bottle runs out.
- Close the cap and check once more. Make sure the diesel cap was never opened. Only then start your car.
Find during the second or third step that the bottle went in the wrong tank? That's where you stop. Leave out step five entirely.
Already put AdBlue in your diesel tank around Sheuchan Parks?
What follows is a short order of things, beginning with not starting your engine. The fuel pump runs on many diesels the moment your ignition is switched on — and so leave it off. Filling up with diesel will not dilute it: instead, AdBlue drops to the bottom of the tank, just where the fuel is drawn from.
If you're at a forecourt, whether it is the Solo or the Morrisons, ask the staff to help roll the car away from the pump. If you are on your own driveway around Sheuchan Parks, leave the car where it sits.
If the engine has already run, stop as soon as it is safe and switch off. On the M77, over 50 miles from Sheuchan Parks, that means the next exit. Distance matters — a quick hop across Sheuchan Parks makes a smaller job than driving under 50 miles towards Belfast — so say about how far it went.
Our arrival around Sheuchan Parks, and what takes place next
Our engineers come to the car wherever it has stopped, whether that's outside the local primary school, close to Stranraer Parish Church or on your own drive. We ask what got in, roughly how much, and whether it has run, because those answers decide the work and the quote. On the phone call itself, you hear our quote — before anything else.
The system is then cleaned thoroughly, once the tank is cleared. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it does not wash out on its own — which is why that counts more with AdBlue than with petrol. Filter cleaned or, where it must be, swapped; clean diesel in; then a test of your car. Before we go, we start the engine and make sure that it's running smoothly.
Unstarted cars mostly need a half-hour job after the moment we arrive. The equipment is fine on a live forecourt, and quiet enough for a residential street late at night. Your insurer will ask for an engineer's report and the VAT invoice, and both are yours once this job is done. Payment is on the day, with no money upfront. While we travel, have a look at your policy; many include cover for misfuelling.
About Sheuchan Parks itself
Sheuchan Parks is a coastal suburban area in Dumfries and Galloway, situated near the town of Stranraer. Sheuchan Parks has a relatively low elevation of 13 metres, and its coastal location provides views of the surrounding sea. Sheuchan Parks is characterised by its predominantly detached housing stock, which reflects the area's residential nature.
Sheuchan Parks and Dumfries and Galloway: AdBlue drains across the area
Sheuchan Parks is a residential suburb, and the teams that cover it also work the towns around it, Stranraer Town and Stranraer among them, across the DG postcode area. Fastest of all: quote a DG9 0 postcode for the van.
Shifting your car isn't necessary. Draining happens on the spot, whether a driveway, a road by Princess Victoria Memorial, or a layby towards Agnew Park. If you are close to a border, or somewhere hard to describe like the back of Blin' Johnny's Awa', ring and ask rather than assuming.
For Sheuchan Parks people, the short version
Read the cap before you tip. Petrol in Diesel drains it on the spot, anywhere around Dumfries and Galloway, if AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank regardless — and so leave the vehicle off and ring 0333 366 0103.