AdBlue in the Diesel Tank in Shirley? Keep It Switched Off
AdBlue in your diesel tank? Then keep the motor off — and the ignition too. AdBlue is urea mixed in water. As it is water-based, it won't ignite and never combines with diesel; damage just starts when the pump begins pulling it. Caught before the engine has run, AdBlue in a diesel tank is generally a drain and a thorough flush, done where your car is around Shirley. Nothing comes before ringing 0333 366 0103.
AdBlue in your diesel tank around Shirley: the first few minutes
Things to do:
- Pocket your keys, and that prevents someone turning the power on.
- Near moving traffic? Then put your hazards on.
- Keep the receipt or the empty bottle, and so you can tell us what got in and roughly how much.
- Tell us a postcode starting SO15 5, or whatever street lies closest, and our van reaches you straight — so call from wherever you are.
Do not:
- Not even for a second, and not to shift your car: the engine stays off.
- Switching the key to ignition by itself sets the pump running on many diesels. Avoid it.
- No more fuel on top. The AdBlue will not blend, so it's pointless.
- Don't drive the vehicle anywhere, not even a short way along St James Road.
- By the road, don't try draining it yourself.
Rolling your car off the pumps is a job for staff to help with, whichever Shirley forecourt you're on, the Shell or any other. If you are on your own drive, leave the vehicle precisely where it is.
What AdBlue does in a diesel tank
Meant for the exhaust, AdBlue has no place in your engine. From a dedicated tank it goes straight to the exhaust, cleaning what your engine lets out. Nothing in it is supposed to pass through a fuel pump, and nothing in a fuel pump is designed to handle it.
It does not combine. Once it is tipped into the tank, AdBlue behaves not at all like diesel. Denser than diesel, it drops and collects underneath it — the same place the pickup draws from. When the pump runs, the AdBlue is first to be pulled through. Until then it waits underneath your diesel, which is why a car topped up in Shirley Park last night and not started stays the simple one, as long as no one touches your key.
After it is sucked in, the harm comes in two forms. It attacks certain metals used in fuel components, working on any part it reaches till it is removed completely. And when the water evaporates, the urea turns into crystals that clog filters and lodge in narrow passages. Overnight, a car sitting in Shirley with AdBlue through its pipework gets worse; where it is just in your tank, nothing changes. Diesel lubricates the high-pressure pump and every injector as it flows; water gives no lubrication, which is a second form of harm.
AdBlue in a diesel: why it is often worse than petrol
Fill a diesel with petrol in error at the BP, and this problem is diluted fuel. Blended into the diesel and left still, it's harmless for now; using the motor does the harm.
AdBlue in a diesel is a fault of the wrong substance altogether. It cannot just be run through, since it doesn't burn. Whether the car sits in Freemantle or the heart of Shirley, firing it up "to see" costs more with AdBlue than nearly any other mistake, and the flush counts more. Why: it will not stay blended, and so diluting it fails; and deposits and corrosion outlast the next fill.
With AdBlue, the good news is no distinct from petrol. Emptying a tank is the simplest part on any fuel system, and without running, the AdBlue stays in it — anywhere around Hampshire the car sits.
How does AdBlue end up in a diesel tank around Shirley?
It is not deliberate. Many vehicles have the AdBlue cap beside the diesel one, now and then behind one flap, and mixing them up is simple in poor light. Most of the time it takes place with a bottle bought on the way home and poured in on the driveway, not at the forecourt.
It tends to take place in a few familiar ways. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up happens in a hurry outside Shirley Infant School. A bottle is poured in at the end of the day on a drive just off Shirley Avenue. Or a driver new to that flap refills the car in dim light, stopped in the car park by Kings Arms.
It comes up the most in a rental, a brand-new vehicle, a fleet motor, or the other car of a family with one of each fuel types — the cars drivers use the least. Wherever you're around Shirley or the rest of Hampshire, it's the same slip and the same first answer: leave it off.
Already started your engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank in Shirley?
The AdBlue has left the tank, then. Through the filter, along the pipework, and — with any running — into the high-pressure pump and every injector: that's where it travels.
Watch for rough running, smoke, falling power, lights on the dash, or a stall — coming back from Colebrook Green, say, or midway across Shirley. Stop as soon as it is safe, switch off, and do not restart the car to check. With each start, more of it is pulled through.
On the M271, under 3 miles from Shirley, the first junction is where to exit, and somewhere sensible is where to stop — not carrying on.
Distance counts: each mile pushes the AdBlue deeper in, and so driving towards Southampton, under 3 miles away, makes a much bigger job than crossing Shirley to the car park by St James Road Methodist Church. Tell us about how far it had come.
Once your engine has run, the flush takes in more, and all of it is done where the car has come to a stop. Spotted quickly, it very rarely leaves long-term damage.
What does an AdBlue drain on a diesel involve in Shirley?
A road beside Shirley Parish Hall, a driveway, a lay-by or a filling station: wherever the car has come to rest in Shirley, we come to it. The job depends on three answers, and we ask for first — what was put in, the quantity, and if the engine has run.
Then the tank is cleared where the car sits, and so the contaminated fuel and the AdBlue come out together. With AdBlue, far more than with petrol, the flush matters: the fuel system is flushed right through since what remains will not wash out unaided. Clean diesel goes in once your filter is flushed — or replaced, if it needs to be — and then the car is tested. Engine not run? Then expect roughly half an hour once we are there for most jobs. Quiet enough to use outside a house at night, and fine on a busy forecourt, our pumps are explosion-proof.
Clean diesel goes in to prime your system, and that is the last step. Whether it is a parking bay at Millbrook (Hants) or a drive in Shirley, that is where we start it and you set off. The test before we go is that it runs smoothly on fresh diesel. As the job is done in its entirety where your car is, a garage never comes into it. Afterwards, there is the paperwork for the insurer: a VAT invoice plus a report from the engineer.
About Shirley, for a moment
Shirley is a suburban area located on the outskirts of Southampton in Hampshire, sitting at an elevation of 28 metres above sea level. Shirley is characterized by its semi-detached housing stock and is situated near the coast, with nearby areas including Upper Shirley, Old Shirley, and Shirley Warren. Shirley is close to the city of Southampton, being only 1.7 miles away, and is approximately 69.1 miles from London. Shirley has a population of around 11,024 residents.
Shirley and Hampshire: AdBlue drains across the area
Throughout the SO postcode area, the teams answering AdBlue call-outs around Shirley serve most of Hampshire as well, Upper Shirley, Old Shirley and Shirley Warren among them. Phone and ask instead of guessing when you're by a border, or anywhere awkward to explain.
Shirley is a residential suburb, and an on-site drain suits it: whether the car is on a home drive, a residential street, a car park or a forecourt, our engineers drain it where it stands, so it never needs to be shifted to us.
What AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to put right around Shirley
Each job is different, and so not one fixed quote is honest. The price moves first with how long, if at all, your engine has been running, and next with the amount of AdBlue that got in. After that it turns on where the car is and whether a van can reach it safely, which is simpler on an open drive than in a tight gap behind Shirley Parish Church.
Which fluid got in, what quantity, and whether the engine ran: every Shirley enquiry opens by asking exactly that, ahead of any figure, never after. Those replies shrink the range down to a single figure.
You hear that price on the phone, before anybody heads out, and you pay on the day, by card or over the phone, with nothing upfront. Check your insurance while we are on the way: plenty include misfuelling cover.
Still alongside your car in Shirley?
Then the most useful thing you can do is nothing to your car. Ignition off, engine off, keys out. Say it's AdBlue, about how big an amount, and whether it ran, on 0333 366 0103. From there Petrol in Diesel handles it, across Shirley or wherever within Hampshire.