Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Sholden
AdBlue in the diesel tank? Then keep your motor off — and the ignition as well. Water with urea mixed in it: that's AdBlue. The trouble begins once it is sucked through the lines — it will not ignite, and it will not combine with diesel. A drain and a thorough flush, done where the vehicle is in Sholden, is normally all AdBlue in a diesel tank takes — if it is caught before your engine has been run. Before you do anything else, phone 0333 366 0103.
What to do straight away, Sholden: AdBlue in the diesel tank
Do these:
- Pocket your keys, and that stops anyone turning the power on.
- If you're anywhere near moving traffic, put the hazards on.
- Which product, and roughly how much amount? Save the bottle or the till receipt, and our engineers will see.
- Call us from where you are. A postcode starting CT14 0, or the name of the closest street, brings our van to you without a search.
Things not to do:
- No starting the engine — not briefly, not to shift the car.
- Plenty of diesels power their fuel pump the instant the ignition goes on, so leave the car off.
- Pouring in more diesel doesn't work: AdBlue settles out rather than blending.
- Leave it where it is instead of driving it anywhere, even a short way up Farm Lane.
- Draining that tank on your own by the road isn't one to try.
Rolling the vehicle away from the pumps is a job for staff to help with, whichever Sholden forecourt you are on, the the nearest petrol station or any other. On that drive, your car remains just where it is.
What does AdBlue do in a diesel tank?
The engine is not what AdBlue is made for; your exhaust is. Its own tank holds it, and from there it is sprayed into your exhaust, and there it cleans the fumes. Nothing in it is meant to pass through a fuel pump, and nothing in a fuel pump is built to handle it.
Tipped in with the diesel, it keeps apart instead of mixing — quite different from fuel. The pickup takes fuel from the deepest part of your tank, and that's precisely where AdBlue settles: as it is denser than diesel, it sinks. When your pump runs, the AdBlue is first to go through. Until then it waits beneath the diesel, which is why a car topped up in Mill Hill last night and not switched on remains the simple case, as long as no one touches your key.
Two kinds of damage come from there. It attacks some metals used in fuel systems, working on any part it reaches till it is removed completely. And when the water evaporates, the urea forms crystals that block filters and lodge in narrow channels. A car left standing around Sholden with AdBlue already in its lines is worse by the morning; one with AdBlue just in its tank isn't. Water protects nothing. The injection pump and every injector need diesel flowing past them, so the water part harms them by itself.
Why AdBlue in a diesel is commonly more major than petrol
Top up a diesel with petrol in error over at the Esso, and this issue is diluted fuel. It mixes with the diesel, and while it is in that tank it causes no harm; the harm comes from running the motor on it.
AdBlue in a diesel is a different matter: not thin fuel, yet no fuel at all. Not burning, it cannot just be run through. Crystals and corrosion stay after the next fill, and AdBlue separates back out of your diesel, so thinning it can't work. That is why the flush counts more, and trying the engine "to see" does more harm with AdBlue than almost any other slip — in Deal or the centre of Sholden equally.
With AdBlue, the good news is no different from petrol. Wherever in Kent your vehicle has stopped, an unstarted engine leaves the AdBlue yet inside the tank: the easiest part of any fuel system to empty.
AdBlue in a diesel tank in Sholden: how it ends up there
Many cars place the AdBlue cap alongside the diesel cap, occasionally behind a single flap, and after dark the two may look identical. No one means it. Most of the time it takes place with a bottle bought on the way home and poured in on the driveway, not at the pump.
It tends to take place in a few familiar ways. Rushing, outside Sholden Church of England Primary School, after a warning lamp flashed on during the school run, a parent tops up your car. In the evening, a container goes in on a drive close to The Glade. Otherwise, in dim light by The Sportsman, your car is topped up by someone opening that flap for the first time.
Rented vehicles, new cars, company cars, or the second car in a family with one of each: the least familiar vehicles see it most. Wherever you are around Sholden or the remainder of Kent, it's the same error and the same first answer: leave it off.
Started the motor with AdBlue in your diesel tank in Sholden?
The AdBlue has left that tank, then. It has been pulled through the filter and your lines, and if your motor ran for any time, it has reached the high-pressure pump and the injectors.
Maybe coming back from Welfare Sports Ground, or part way across Sholden, your motor might go lumpy, smoke, drop pace, light up the dash or cut out. When safe, pull over and switch it off — without turning it on again to test. Every start pulls more of that through.
Exit the M20, under 15 miles from Sholden, by the first junction and park somewhere safe, not driving on.
Distance matters: every mile carries the AdBlue further in, so heading towards Canterbury, under 15 miles away, makes a much larger job than hopping across Sholden to the car park by Sholden Village Hall. Tell us about how far it had come.
Wherever the vehicle came to a halt is where all of it gets done, even with more to clean out once the engine has been run. If it is caught early, long-term damage is very uncommon.
What emptying AdBlue from a diesel involves in Sholden
The vehicle remains put, whether that is a street beside St Nicholas, a driveway, a layby or a forecourt in Sholden, and the van comes to it. The work rests on three replies, which our engineers ask for before all else — what went in, the quantity, and if your engine has turned over.
On the spot, the tank is then drained, and all of the polluted diesel and the urea come out at once. With AdBlue, far more than with petrol, the flush counts: the whole system is flushed right through because what remains won't flush out unaided. Fresh diesel goes in once the filter is cleaned — or replaced, when it needs to be — and after that your car is tested. About half an hour once we arrive is typical for most jobs where your motor hasn't run. The pumping gear is explosion-proof, so a busy forecourt is no problem, and it is quiet enough for a residential street after dark.
The last step is to bleed your system on fresh diesel. You head off as soon as we have started the car, and it makes no difference whether the vehicle is on a driveway around Sholden or in a space outside Deal. It is checked on clean diesel to confirm it runs properly before our technicians head off. Our technicians do it all wherever the vehicle has ended up, and it never needs to be taken to a workshop. Insurers want a VAT invoice and an engineer report, and both come at the end.
About Sholden itself
Sholden is a small village on the coast of Kent, situated near the towns of Deal and Canterbury. Sholden has a population of around 1489 people and is characterized by semi-detached housing. Sholden sits at a low elevation of 11 metres above sea level, close to the nearby villages of Upper Deal, Great Mongeham, and Middle Deal.
AdBlue drains across Kent, Sholden included
The vans that answer AdBlue calls around Sholden also cover the places around it, Upper Deal, Great Mongeham and Middle Deal among them, and most of Kent beyond, across the CT postcode area. Near a boundary, or somewhere awkward to pin down? Checking is better than assuming, so ring.
No moving is needed. In Sholden, a coastal village, a mobile service fits: the vehicle is drained where it stands, be it in a drive, a residential street, a car park or a filling station.
What does AdBlue in a diesel tank cost to sort out in Sholden?
There is no fair single quote, since the jobs are not the same. Three things move the price: whether the engine has been running and for how long, how much AdBlue was put in, and where your car is. That last one rests on whether a technician can get to it safely, and an open drive is easier than a tight spot behind Deal Parish Church of St. Leonard's.
That's why every call from Sholden starts with the same three questions, asked before giving a figure, not after: what got in, how much, and if it's run. Once they are answered, a range becomes a single firm figure.
Before a van sets off, you hear the quote by phone. Then you pay on the day, by card or by phone, with nothing in advance. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it is worth checking yours whilst we are on the way.
Next to the vehicle around Sholden, right now?
Leaving your vehicle alone is, right now, the best move open to you. Keys out, motor off, ignition off. Petrol in Diesel handles the remainder, in Sholden or anywhere in Kent, once you ring 0333 366 0103 to say it's AdBlue, roughly what quantity, and whether it ran.