AdBlue in the Diesel Tank in Sholing? Keep It Switched Off
With AdBlue in the diesel tank, your ignition remains off and so does the engine. Water with urea mixed in it: that's AdBlue. Unlike fuel, it neither ignites nor mixes, and nothing starts until the motor sucks it through. Caught before your engine has run, AdBlue in a diesel tank is generally a drain and a thorough flush, done where the car is in Sholing. Before you do anything else, phone 0333 366 0103.
Those opening minutes: AdBlue in the diesel tank in Sholing
Things to do:
- Remove the keys, which stops anyone turning the power on.
- If you are at all near moving traffic, put the hazards on.
- So you can tell us which fluid it was and about how much, keep your receipt or the empty bottle.
- Give us a postcode starting SO19 1, or whichever street is closest, and the van finds you directly — so call wherever you are.
Things not to do:
- Do not start your motor, even for a moment to shift the car.
- Do not switch the ignition on. On plenty of diesels that alone runs the fuel pump.
- No more fuel on top. The AdBlue will not blend, so it's wasted.
- Keep the car where it is rather than driving it anywhere, even a short stretch up Canterbury Avenue.
- Draining that tank on your own beside the road isn't one to try.
Ask the attendants to help you roll the car off the pumps if you are at a forecourt in Sholing, whether it is the Southampton Logs or somewhere else. Stopped on your own driveway? Then it remains exactly where it is.
AdBlue in a diesel tank: what it does
Not your engine but your exhaust is where AdBlue belongs. It goes into its own tank and is sprayed into the exhaust gas to clean it. Not one side suits the other: urea doesn't belong in an injection pump, and a pump can't deal with urea.
It does not combine. After it is poured into the tank, AdBlue acts not at all like diesel. The pickup sucks fuel from the deepest part of that tank, and that's just where AdBlue settles: as it is denser than diesel, it sinks. Simplest of all: a vehicle that had AdBlue in Merry Oak overnight and has not turned since. The liquid waits at the foot of the tank, untouched — but it will be the first thing through if the motor starts, ahead of any diesel at all.
It causes two kinds of harm from there. It attacks some metals found in fuel systems, working on whatever it reaches until it is cleared completely. And once the water goes, the urea forms crystals that clog filters and lodge in narrow passages. A motor left sitting around Sholing with AdBlue already in its lines is worse by the morning; one with AdBlue only in its tank isn't. Water lubricates nothing. The high-pressure pump and every injector need diesel running past them, so the water part harms them by itself.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel often the bigger problem?
Top up a diesel with petrol in error over at the BP, and this issue is thinned fuel. Damage just comes from running on it. Mixed into your diesel and sitting inside your tank, it causes none.
AdBlue in a diesel is a problem of the wrong substance altogether. It does not burn, so it cannot simply be run through. Crystals and corrosion stay after the following fill, and AdBlue splits back from your diesel, so thinning it won't help. That is why the flush counts so much, and trying the engine "to see" costs more here than almost any other mistake — in Weston or the centre of Sholing alike.
With AdBlue, the good news is no different from petrol. Anywhere around Hampshire the car has come to rest, an unstarted motor means the AdBlue yet inside the tank: the simplest bit of any fuel system to clear.
How AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank in Sholing
No one means to do it. The AdBlue filler on many motors waits right next to your diesel filler, at times under the same flap, and the two caps can look alike in poor light. A bottle bought when driving home and tipped in at home, instead of at the filling station, is the typical story.
The ways it takes place are few and familiar. The top-up gets rushed outside Valentine Primary School & Nursery, after your dash lit up with a warning as the kids were taken in. Close to Swanmore Avenue, someone pours a bottle in at home in the evening. Another pattern: darkness, the car park by The Spike Islander, and a driver using that flap the first time.
The least familiar cars see it most — hire cars, brand-new cars, company cars, and the other motor in a home with one of each fuel types. An identical slip, same first response — leave it switched off — wherever you happen to be around Sholing or the rest of Hampshire.
Already started the engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank around Sholing?
In that case, the AdBlue is no longer in your tank. It's been pulled through your filter and your lines, and if the engine ran for any time, it has reached the high-pressure fuel pump and your injectors.
Perhaps returning from Sholing Village Green, or midway across Sholing, the motor might run rough, smoke, drop power, light up your dash or stall. Stop when it is safe. Switch off. Keep it off rather than testing it again. With each start, more of it is pulled through.
Exit the M27, under 3 miles from Sholing, at the first junction and park somewhere safe, not driving on.
Hopping across Sholing to the car park by Sholing Community Centre is one thing; heading towards Southampton, under 3 miles away, is another, since every mile carries the AdBlue further in. So distance counts. Let us know about how far it had come.
There is more to flush once your engine has been started, and we do all of it where the vehicle has come to a stop. When it's noticed early, permanent damage is very uncommon.
Emptying AdBlue in a diesel around Sholing: what it takes
Our technicians come to the vehicle, wherever it has stopped around Sholing: a side street near New Community Church Sholing, a drive, a lay-by or a forecourt. Before anything else our technicians ask what got in, about how much, and whether your engine has been run, since those replies decide the work.
Then your tank is cleared where the vehicle stands, so the tainted fuel and the AdBlue come out together. The fuel system is cleaned thoroughly, which matters more with AdBlue than with petrol, because what it leaves behind does not rinse out on its own. Clean diesel goes in once your filter is cleaned — or replaced, when it needs to be — and then your vehicle is tested. Most of these jobs are a half-hour job once we turn up, if the engine hasn't run. Explosion-proof pumps make a live forecourt sensible to work on, and they're quiet enough not to disturb the street at night.
The last step is to bleed your system on fresh diesel. Whether it's a parking space at the nearest station or a driveway around Sholing, that is where we start it and you drive off. The test before our engineers head off is that it runs properly on fresh diesel. The whole job is done where the vehicle is, so it never needs to go to a garage. At the end, there is paperwork for your insurer: a VAT invoice plus a written report from the engineer.
About Sholing itself
Sholing is a suburban area located on the coast in southern Hampshire, sitting approximately 2.5 miles east of Southampton city centre. Sholing occupies a relatively low-lying area, with an average elevation of around 39 metres above sea level. Sholing is bordered by nearby places such as Hightown, Thornhill, and Sholing Common, and is characterized by its predominantly semi-detached housing stock. Sholing is situated about 67 miles south-west of London, making it a commuter hub for the region.
AdBlue drains across Sholing and Hampshire
Throughout the SO postcode area, the teams taking AdBlue jobs around Sholing reach much of Hampshire as well, Hightown, Thornhill and Sholing Common included. Close to a boundary, or somewhere tricky to explain? Asking is better than guessing, and so ring.
Sholing is a residential suburb, and a call-out 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 is, and so it never needs to be shifted to us.
Sholing: what AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to fix
There's no fair single quote, because the jobs aren't the same. What shifts the cost is, first, whether the engine has been running and for how long; then how much AdBlue went in; and after that where your car is and whether a technician can reach it safely, which is easier on an open driveway than in a tight space behind Monty's Community Hub.
For that reason, each enquiry from Sholing begins with the same trio — which fluid went in, how much, whether the engine ran — before a quote. Once those are known, a range turns into a single fixed number.
Priced on the call before the van sets out, it is paid for on the day — card or phone, nothing in advance. Misfuelling cover comes with many insurance policies, so it pays to look at yours before the van gets there.
Alongside the car in Sholing, still?
Then, the best thing to do with your vehicle is to leave it. Ignition off, engine off, keys out. Tell us it was AdBlue, roughly what quantity, and if it ran, on 0333 366 0103. After that Petrol in Diesel handles it, in Sholing or wherever in Hampshire.