Preventing AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Silver End: Why It Happens
AdBlue already in the diesel tank? Then set this page aside for now, keep the ignition and motor off, and phone 0333 366 0103. Caught before the motor runs, it's usually a drain and a thorough flush, done where the vehicle is around Silver End. Nothing happened yet? Further down, the rest of the page explains the why it takes place and the how to avoid it altogether.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel vehicle
Plenty of modern diesels in Hawbush Green, like those in Silver End, run on two fluids; your motor takes just your diesel. Stored in a tank of its own, AdBlue is fed into your exhaust stream to clean it.
Different tanks, separate fillers. Other vehicles put the AdBlue filler in your boot or under the bonnet; a lot more have the two side by side under one flap. Diesel gets filled at every filling station call-out, week in, week out. Much less often, the AdBlue side is filled — normally from a bottle, by a person working out where it goes. It is in that gap that the mistake lives.
Silver End: how AdBlue in your diesel tank occurs
Seldom is it carelessness: normally three things coincide.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low the vehicle tells you, and if it runs out completely, the vehicle goes into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a drive off Broadway before work, or in the car park outside The Western Arms on the way home.
Then, your hand goes for the cap it would have used on the old car — because a rental car, a new vehicle or a company car places the fillers where your last one did not.
Lastly, the bottle fits: a diesel filler or AdBlue filler, it goes in just as easily, and once the pour begins, nothing halts it. Clapdog Green or the heart of Silver End: it takes the same few seconds in both.
The AdBlue filler and your diesel filler: telling them apart
Be it a Silver End forecourt or a driveway over in Perry Green, spend a few seconds over these before anything goes in.
- The cap. The AdBlue cap is commonly blue, or marked "AdBlue". The diesel cap usually isn't. Read it rather than going by position.
- Plenty of motors give AdBlue the smaller neck of the two.
- Look inside the fuel flap: many vehicles have a label there saying which fuel goes where.
- In your boot or under the bonnet: that's where the filler sits if it's not by the diesel cap, and the handbook says which.
- The person who drove the car last. On a hire or company car picked up from somewhere like the car park outside White Notley, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
Keeping AdBlue out of the diesel tank when you top up
When the light comes on, wherever around Essex, follow this routine.
- Switch off after you park — level ground, motor off, and not in a rush beside Walter Way at the roadside.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, after you find the AdBlue filler and reading it. Silly, yes, yet it does the trick.
- If both sit under one flap, check your diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — then leave the car on.
- Slowly does it, through the bottle's own spout, till it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Only then, start the car: close the cap, check a second time, and make sure the diesel cap was never opened.
Find at stage two or three that it has already gone into your diesel side? Then stop just there. Leave out stage five entirely.
Already put AdBlue in the diesel tank in Silver End?
Do not start the motor: that is where the short order of things starts. Keep the ignition off too, because on many diesels switching it on alone starts the fuel pump. AdBlue doesn't mix with diesel — it sinks to the bottom of the tank, where your fuel is drawn from — so do not top up with diesel to dilute it.
If you are on a forecourt, whether it is the TotalEnergies or the BP, ask the attendants to help roll the car clear of the pump. Your own driveway around Silver End is the place it should stay.
When your motor has been run by now, stop somewhere safe then turn the vehicle off. On the M11, under 25 miles from Silver End, that means the next exit. Mileage counts — a short hop across Silver End makes a smaller job than driving under 10 miles towards Chelmsford — so say roughly how far it went.
Silver End: what happens when our technicians turn up
Anywhere your car has stopped, be it outside Silver End Academy, beside Silver End Congregational Church or on your own drive, our van comes to it. Those replies decide this work and the quote, so we ask what got in, about how much, and whether it's run. Nobody sets off before you've had the price by phone.
The fuel system is then cleaned thoroughly, after that tank is emptied. More than with petrol, it counts with AdBlue: the crystals form, some metals are attacked, and none of that washes away unaided, however long it sits. The filter cleaned or, if it must be, replaced; fresh diesel in; and then a test of your car. We do not go until it has been fired up and is running smoothly.
With pumps safe on a working forecourt and quiet enough for use outside a house at night, most jobs where the engine hasn't run need roughly half an hour after we arrive. Nothing upfront; you settle up on the day. Afterwards, a VAT invoice and the report from the engineer are handed to you for the insurer. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it's worth checking yours while we are on the way.
About Silver End itself
Silver End is a village in Essex, situated inland at an elevation of 53 metres, approximately 9.9 miles from Chelmsford and 39.8 miles from London. Silver End has a population of around 2386 people, with semi-detached housing being the predominant type. Silver End is surrounded by nearby places such as Clapdog Green, Cressing, and Lanham Green, and remains a residential community with a rural setting. Silver End sits within the wider landscape of the Eastern region, characterised by gently rolling hills and arable farmland.
AdBlue drains across Essex, Silver End included
Throughout CM postcodes, our vans that cover Silver End — a rural village — work the surrounding places too, Lanham Green and Cressing among them. The van gets to you fastest with a postcode starting CM8 3.
The car stays put. Our engineers drain it where it is — a side street close to Silver End Library, a lay-by on the way to Tudor Garden, a drive. Ring and ask instead of assuming if you are near a border, or somewhere hard to describe, like the back of Silver End Village Hall.
In short, for Silver End people
Before you tip, read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank anyway, leave it off and call 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it sits, anywhere across Essex.