Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Sion Hill
AdBlue in your diesel tank? Then keep your engine off — and the ignition too. Chemically, AdBlue is just urea in water. Being water-based, it won't burn and won't blend with diesel; trouble just comes when your pump starts drawing it. A drain and a thorough flush, done where the vehicle is around Sion Hill, is generally what AdBlue in a diesel tank takes — if it's caught before your motor has been run. Ring 0333 366 0103 before you do anything else.
Sion Hill, AdBlue in your diesel tank: what to do at once
Things to do:
- Keys out — that way no one can power anything on.
- Put your hazards on if you're anywhere close to moving traffic.
- So you can tell us which fluid it was and about how much, save the receipt or the empty bottle.
- Our van finds you quickest with a postcode starting BA1 2, or just the name of a street nearby, so phone from the spot.
Not to do:
- Shifting your vehicle even a few yards is no reason to fire up your engine.
- The ignition stays off: on many diesels, switching it on is enough to run the fuel pump.
- Don't top up with diesel to thin it. AdBlue does not dilute in diesel; it separates out.
- Even a short distance up Winifred's Lane is too far to drive it.
- Emptying your tank on your own beside the road is not one to try.
At a forecourt in Sion Hill, whether it's the Esso or another one, ask the attendants to help you roll the car away from the pump. At your own driveway, don't touch it at all.
What does AdBlue do in a diesel tank?
The engine is not what AdBlue is made for; the exhaust is. Its own reservoir holds it, and from there it is sprayed into your exhaust, where it cleans the fumes. Nothing inside an injection pump is made for this fluid — and no part of that was intended to go that way.
Fuel blends; AdBlue, once poured in, won't. Its behaviour is nothing like fuel's. The pickup takes fuel from the deepest part of that tank, and that's just where AdBlue settles: being denser than diesel, it sinks. Easiest of all: one that got AdBlue in Walcot overnight and has not turned since. The liquid sits at the foot of the tank, undrawn — but it will be first through if your engine starts, before any diesel at all.
It causes two kinds of damage from there. It attacks some metals found in fuel components, working on any part it touches till it is removed from the system. And when the water goes, the urea forms crystals that clog filters and lodge in tiny passages. Lines holding AdBlue mean harm by morning for a car sitting in Sion Hill. Only in your tank, it stays the same. Diesel lubricates the high-pressure pump and every injector as it passes; water offers none of that, which is a second form of harm.
Petrol or AdBlue in a diesel: why AdBlue is regularly worse
A problem of thin fuel is what you get after fuelling a diesel with petrol from the Sainsbury's. It mixes with your diesel, and while it's in the tank it does no damage; the harm comes from running the engine on it.
AdBlue in a diesel is a different problem: not thin fuel, but no fuel at all. It doesn't burn, and so it cannot just be run through. Whether your vehicle sits in Weston Park or the heart of Sion Hill, turning it over "to see" does more harm with AdBlue than almost any other mistake, and the flush counts more. Why: it won't stay blended, so diluting it fails; and crystals and corrosion survive the next fill.
The same good news holds as with petrol. Emptying a tank is the simplest part on any fuel system, and with no running, the AdBlue remains in there — anywhere across Somerset your car has stopped.
How AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank in Sion Hill
Plenty of vehicles place the AdBlue cap beside the diesel one, occasionally under one flap, and after dark the two may appear the same. No one means it. Usually it's not the filling station: a driver buys a container heading home and pours it in outside the house.
It tends to happen in a few familiar ways. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up takes place in a hurry outside St Andrew's Church School. Near Sion Hill, someone tips a container in on that drive after work. Or someone unfamiliar with that flap refills your car in dim light, stopped in the car park by The Marlborough Tavern.
It takes place most in the motors people know least: a hire car, a new car, a company car, or the second motor of a household with one diesel and one petrol. Wherever you are in Sion Hill or the rest of Somerset, it is the same slip and the same first answer: leave the car off.
Started the motor with AdBlue in the diesel tank in Sion Hill?
Then the tank is no longer where the AdBlue is. Given any running, it goes on to the injection pump and each injector, having passed via the filter and lines.
Expect rough running, exhaust smoke, lost power, warnings on the dash, or a stall — coming back from The High Common, say, or part way across Sion Hill. Once you safely can, pull over and turn it off — with no turning it on again to test. More of that is pulled through with each start.
Sion Hill sits under 10 miles from the M4; if you were on it, exit by the next junction and stop somewhere safe instead of driving on.
Hopping across Sion Hill to the car park by The Bhakti Centre is one thing; heading towards Bath, under a mile away, is another, since every mile pushes the AdBlue deeper in. So distance counts. Roughly how far it had come is worth telling us.
Our engineers do all of the flushing where the vehicle has ended up, and once the motor has been started there is more of it. Caught quickly, it very seldom leaves long-term damage.
What draining AdBlue from a diesel involves in Sion Hill
A street beside St. Stephen's Church, a driveway, a layby or a forecourt: wherever your car has stopped in Sion Hill, our technicians come to it. Before anything else our engineers ask what went in, about how much, and if the motor has run, since those replies determine this work.
Next, emptying the tank right there takes out the contaminated diesel along with the AdBlue together. A full flush matters much more after AdBlue than with petrol, because what remains won't wash out by itself. Testing your car follows at the end, after fresh diesel is added and the fuel filter is flushed or, where needed, swapped. Engine not run? In that case count on about half an hour on site for most jobs. Our equipment is explosion-proof, so a busy filling station is no problem, and it's hushed enough for a residential street after dark.
Bleeding the system with fresh diesel comes last. Whether it's a parking space by Oldfield Park or a drive in Sion Hill, that is where our technicians fire it up and you head off. We make sure it runs smoothly on clean diesel before we go. As the job is done in its entirety where the car is, a workshop never comes into it. Insurers want a VAT invoice and an engineer report, and both come at the end.
About Sion Hill and where it is
Sion Hill is a suburban area located on the outskirts of Bath in Somerset, sitting at an elevation of around 100 metres near the lakeside. Sion Hill is characterized by its predominantly flat housing stock, with many residents enjoying views of the surrounding countryside. Sion Hill is close to several other nearby places, including Lansdown, Primrose Hill, and Beacon Hill, and is situated approximately 0.8 miles from the city centre of Bath.
AdBlue drains across Somerset, Sion Hill included
Lansdown, Primrose Hill and Beacon Hill are among the places around Sion Hill that the same vans reach, together with much of Somerset beyond, throughout the BA postcode area. Assuming doesn't help by a border or anywhere tricky to pin down; ring and check.
Sion Hill 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 is, and so it never needs to be shifted to us.
Sion Hill: what AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to fix
Because the callouts differ, a single figure would not be honest. Whether the engine has run, and for how long, comes first in what shifts the price. How much AdBlue got in comes next, and then the location of the car, since an open drive is simpler for a van to get to safely than a tight gap behind Saint Andrew's.
With that reason, every call from Sion Hill opens with the identical trio — which fluid got in, how much, if it ran — before any figure. The replies turn a range into a straight price.
You get that quote by phone, before anyone heads out, and you pay on the day, by card or over the phone, with nothing upfront. While the van is on the way, dig out your policy: plenty cover misfuelling.
In Sion Hill and still alongside the car?
Then the most handy thing you can do is nothing to the vehicle. Keys out, engine off, ignition off. Say it's AdBlue, roughly how big an amount, and if the engine ran, on 0333 366 0103. After that Petrol in Diesel handles it, in Sion Hill or anywhere in Somerset.