AdBlue in the Diesel Tank in Sidcot? Keep It Switched Off
If AdBlue has gone into your diesel tank, keep the motor off then leave your ignition off. Water with urea mixed in it: that's AdBlue. Being water-based, it won't burn and never combines with diesel; trouble just starts when the pump starts drawing it. In Sidcot, AdBlue in a diesel tank caught before the engine runs normally means a drain and a thorough flush, right where the vehicle is. Nothing comes before ringing 0333 366 0103.
Those opening minutes: AdBlue in the diesel tank in Sidcot
Do these:
- Pull the keys out, so no one switches the ignition on.
- If you're at all near moving traffic, put the hazards on.
- Which fluid, and roughly how much quantity? Save the bottle or the receipt, and our engineers will know.
- Our van locates you quickest with a postcode starting BS25 1, or simply the name of a street close by, so call from the spot.
Never:
- Shifting your vehicle just a short way is no reason to start your motor.
- Plenty of diesels power their fuel pump the instant your ignition comes on, so keep the vehicle off.
- Don't top up with diesel to dilute it. AdBlue does not dilute in diesel; it separates out.
- Don't drive the car anywhere, not even a short stretch up Fountain Lane.
- Don't try to drain the vehicle yourself by the roadside.
The staff on duty at any Sidcot forecourt — the Texaco among them — will usually help rolling it clear if you ask. If you're on your own drive, leave the vehicle just where it sits.
What AdBlue does in a diesel tank
AdBlue is made for your exhaust, not your motor. Kept in a separate tank, it is injected into the exhaust stream to clean the gases. A fuel pump isn't designed to cope with it, and AdBlue was never intended to travel through one.
Fuel mixes; AdBlue, once tipped in, will not. Its behaviour is not at all like diesel's. Denser than diesel, it drops and collects underneath it — the very place the pickup sucks from. When your pump runs, the AdBlue is top of the list to go through. Before then it waits beneath the diesel, and that is how a vehicle filled in Hale Coombe last night and never started remains the simple one, as long as nobody touches the key.
It does two kinds of harm from there. As its water goes, the urea left behind crystallises, and the crystals block filters and settle in fine passages. And it's corrosive to some of the metals a fuel system is made from, so it keeps working on the parts it gets to for as long as it stays there. A vehicle left standing around Sidcot with AdBlue already in its lines is worse by the morning; one with AdBlue just in its tank isn't. And there is the water: it offers no lubrication to the components that need it the most — the high-pressure pump and each injector.
Petrol or AdBlue in a diesel: why AdBlue is commonly worse
A fault of thinned fuel is what you end up with from filling a diesel with petrol from the another forecourt nearby. It mixes with the diesel, and whilst it is inside your tank it does no damage; the harm comes from running your engine on it.
AdBlue in a diesel is a different problem: not thin fuel, yet no fuel at all. It cannot just be run through, because it doesn't burn. It doesn't stay mixed, so it cannot be thinned. And crystals and corrosion do not wash out with the next tank of fuel. That is why the flush matters more with AdBlue than with petrol, and why starting the motor "to see" costs more here than almost anywhere else, whether the vehicle is in Star or the middle of Sidcot.
The same good news holds as with petrol. Emptying a tank is the simplest job on any fuel system, and without running, the AdBlue stays in it — wherever around Somerset the vehicle has stopped.
Sidcot: how AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank
Plenty of motors put the AdBlue filler alongside the diesel one, now and then behind one flap, and in dim light the two may appear the same. Nobody means it. It mostly happens at home, from a bottle grabbed en route home, rather than at the filling station.
A few familiar ways account for most cases. Halfway through the morning drop-off, the dashboard warns, and outside Winscombe Primary School the top-up is rushed. In the evening, a container goes in on a driveway near Oakridge Lane. Another version: dim light, the car park outside The Woodborough Inn, and someone opening that flap for the first time.
Hired motors, brand-new vehicles, fleet vehicles, or the spare vehicle in a family with one of each: the least familiar cars get it most. Same slip, an identical first response — leave it switched off — wherever you happen to be around Sidcot or the rest of Somerset.
Started the motor with AdBlue in the diesel tank in Sidcot?
Then that tank is no longer where the AdBlue is. Given any running, it goes on to the high-pressure pump and each injector, after passing via your filter and lines.
You may notice your engine running roughly, smoking, losing power, showing warning lights or cutting out, perhaps on the way back from King's Wood or halfway across Sidcot. Stop as soon as it is safe, switch off, and do not restart the vehicle to check. Each start pulls more of that through.
Sidcot sits under 3 miles from the M5; if you were on it, exit at the first junction and pull up somewhere safe rather than driving on.
How far it went counts. A few hundred yards across Sidcot to the car park by Winscombe Library is a very different job from a run towards Wells, under 15 miles away, with the AdBlue reaching further into the fuel system with every mile. Let us know about how far it had come.
Wherever the car came to a stop is where all of it gets done, even with more to clean out after the motor has been run. Noticed soon, it very seldom leaves lasting damage.
What does an AdBlue drain on a diesel involve around Sidcot?
Anywhere it has come to rest around Sidcot — a forecourt, a lay-by, a drive, a road beside Winscombe Community Centre — the van comes to the car. Before anything else we ask what got in, roughly how much, and whether the engine has run, since those answers settle the work.
Right there, that tank is then drained, and all of the polluted diesel and the urea come out at once. What remains from AdBlue will not wash away by itself, so the whole system gets a careful flush, which matters much more here than for petrol. Testing your vehicle follows at the end, once clean diesel is added and the filter gets cleaned or, if necessary, replaced. About half an hour once we arrive is usual for most jobs where your engine hasn't run. The pumps are explosion-proof, fine on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night.
Fresh diesel goes in to prime your system, and that is the final step. Whether it is a parking bay at Worle or a drive in Sidcot, that is where our engineers fire it up and you drive off. The check before we head off is that it runs smoothly on new diesel. The entire job is done where your car is, so it never has to be taken to a workshop. You get a VAT invoice and an engineer report afterwards, which is what insurers want.
About Sidcot and where it is
Sidcot is a suburban area in inland Somerset, situated approximately 10 miles from the city of Wells and 117 miles west of London. Sidcot has a relatively low elevation of 81 metres and is surrounded by nearby places such as Woodborough, Winterhead, and Winscombe. Sidcot is characterised by its predominantly detached housing stock, reflecting its residential nature. Sidcot remains a small but distinct community within the wider region.
Sidcot and Somerset: AdBlue drains across the area
Our vans that answer AdBlue calls around Sidcot also cover the locations round it, Woodborough, Winterhead and Winscombe among them, and most of Somerset beyond, across the BS postcode area. If you are near a border, or somewhere hard to explain, ring and ask rather than guessing.
A van that comes to you fits Sidcot, a residential suburb: there's no need to bring the vehicle to us, because we drain it on the spot, on a driveway, a residential street, a parking area or a filling station.
What AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to put right around Sidcot
Every job differs, so no single quote would be fair. Whether the motor has run, and for how long, comes first in what shifts the cost. How much AdBlue got in comes next, and then the position of the car, because an open drive is simpler for a van to get to safely than a tight space behind St James Church.
What was put in, how much, plus if it ran: each Sidcot call begins by asking exactly those, before a quote, never afterwards. When they are answered, a range becomes a single firm number.
Our price is given during the call, before a van sets off; settling up happens on the day, by card or over the phone, with nothing upfront. As the van is on the way, check your policy: plenty cover misfuelling.
Still beside your car around Sidcot?
Not touching the car is, then, the most useful move open to you. Keys out, motor off, ignition off. Petrol in Diesel takes over the remainder, across Sidcot or wherever within Somerset, once you phone 0333 366 0103 saying it was AdBlue, about how big an amount, and whether it ran.