AdBlue in the Diesel Tank in Somers Town? Keep It Switched Off
If AdBlue has gone into your diesel tank, keep your motor off and leave your ignition off. AdBlue is urea dissolved in water. As it is water-based, it will not burn and never combines with diesel; trouble just starts when the pump starts drawing it. If your motor hasn't run yet, AdBlue in a diesel tank is usually drained and thoroughly flushed where your car stands around Somers Town. Nothing comes before ringing 0333 366 0103.
Those opening minutes: AdBlue in your diesel tank around Somers Town
Things to do:
- So no one can turn the ignition on, pull the keys away.
- If you are anywhere near moving traffic, put your hazards on.
- So you can give us which liquid it was and roughly what quantity, save the receipt or the empty bottle.
- Call just where you are. Say a PO1 2 postcode or the nearest street sign, and nobody has to search for you.
Do not do these:
- Don't start the motor, even for a moment to move the vehicle.
- Turning the key to ignition alone starts the pump going on plenty of diesels. Skip it.
- AdBlue does not dilute in diesel — it separates out — so adding more fuel will not thin it.
- Any driving at all is to be avoided, including a short distance up Hyde Park Road.
- Emptying your tank yourself beside the road isn't one to try.
The attendants on duty at any Somers Town filling station — the Esso among them — will usually help pushing it aside if you ask. On the drive, the vehicle remains exactly as it was left.
AdBlue in a diesel tank: what it does
AdBlue is made for your exhaust, not the motor. Its own tank holds it, and from there it is fed into the exhaust, where it treats the gas. No part in a fuel pump is made for this liquid — and none of that was intended to travel that way.
Poured in with your diesel, it stays separate instead of mixing — quite different from fuel. It's heavier than diesel, so it sinks and gathers at the bottom of your tank, which is where the pickup pulls fuel from. A car filled on a drive in Southsea overnight and left unstarted counts as the simple one. Nothing has sucked the AdBlue up so far — though once your engine runs, that's what goes first, directly from the bottom of that tank.
Two kinds of harm come from there. Crystals and corrosion. As the water evaporates, it leaves urea that hardens in filter elements and tiny passages; meanwhile, since it attacks certain metals, every part it touches keeps suffering for as long as it stays in there. Where the AdBlue has reached the pipework, waiting till morning in Somers Town leaves things worse. In your tank alone, time does nothing. Water lubricates nothing. The high-pressure pump and each injector need diesel flowing through them, and so the water part harms them in its own right.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel commonly the bigger fault?
Top up a diesel with petrol by mistake at the Asda, and this issue is diluted fuel. No harm is done while it sits put, blended into the diesel — only when your motor works on it.
The issue with AdBlue in a diesel is a completely unsuitable substance. It does not burn, so it cannot just be run through. It doesn't stay mixed, so it can't be weakened. And crystals and corrosion do not wash out with the next tank of fuel. That's why the flush counts more with AdBlue than with petrol, and why starting the motor "to see" costs more here than nearly anywhere else, whether the car is in Landport or the middle of Somers Town.
The good news is the same as with petrol. If your motor has not run, the AdBlue is still inside the tank, and your tank is the quickest part of a fuel system to clear, wherever in Hampshire the car is standing.
Somers Town: how AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank
No one means to do it. The AdBlue filler on many vehicles waits right next to your diesel filler, sometimes under the same flap, and the two caps can look alike in poor light. It usually takes place at home, from a container bought en route home, rather than at the forecourt.
The ways it happens are few and familiar. The top-up gets rushed outside Ark Ayrton Primary Academy, because the dash flashed with a warning while the children were taken in. Close to Winston Churchill Avenue, someone tips a bottle in on that drive in the evening. Another version: dim light, a pub car park by The Raven, and someone opening that flap for the first time.
Rented vehicles, new motors, company cars, or the spare vehicle in a family with both fuels: the least known cars get it most. Leave it off: that is the first step to an identical slip, wherever around Somers Town or the remainder of Hampshire you happen to be.
Somers Town: started the engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank?
Then that tank is no longer where the AdBlue is. Your filter and pipework have had it sucked along, and some running takes it on to the high-pressure pump and each injector.
Maybe coming back from Somerstown Community Park, or part way across Somers Town, the engine may go rough, smoke, drop power, flash the dash or stall. No restarting to test: pull over when safe, then switch it off. Each start pulls more of that through.
If you were on the M275, under a mile from Somers Town, come off at the next exit and stop somewhere safe rather than pressing on.
Distance matters: each mile carries the AdBlue further in, and so driving for Portsmouth, under a mile away, gives a much bigger job than crossing Somers Town to the car park by Portsmouth Magistrates Court. Let us know roughly how far it had come.
Wherever your car came to a stop is where all of it gets done, even with more to clean out after the motor has been running. Noticed soon, it very seldom leaves lasting damage.
What clearing AdBlue from a diesel involves around Somers Town
A road by St Luke's Church, a driveway, a layby or a forecourt: anywhere your car has stopped around Somers Town, our engineers travel to it. What went in, roughly how much, and whether your motor has been run: our engineers check before all else, because those decide the work.
Next, emptying your tank on the spot takes out the contaminated diesel along with the AdBlue together. A careful flush counts far more after AdBlue than after petrol, since residue will not wash out on its own. A test of the car comes last, once fresh diesel goes in and the fuel filter is cleaned or, where necessary, swapped. If your engine hasn't run, most jobs take about half an hour once our engineers arrive. Our pumping gear is explosion-proof, and so a busy filling station is no problem, and it's quiet enough for a residential street after dark.
Last, the fuel system is primed with clean diesel. You drive off as soon as our engineers have fired it up, and it makes no difference whether your car is on a drive in Somers Town or in a bay outside Portsmouth & Southsea. It is tested on clean diesel to confirm it runs correctly before our technicians go. The whole job is done where your car is, so it never has to go to a workshop. Your insurer is likely to want an engineer's report and your VAT invoice — both yours once the job is done.
About Somers Town, for a moment
Somers Town is a suburban area located on the coast of Hampshire, situated near the city of Portsmouth. Somers Town sits at a low elevation of around 7 metres, with its predominant housing being flats. Somers Town is close to nearby places such as Fratton and Portsea, and is approximately 64 miles from London.
Somers Town and Hampshire: AdBlue drains across the area
The teams that answer AdBlue call-outs in Somers Town also cover the spots round it, Portsmouth, Fratton and Portsea among them, and most of Hampshire beyond, across the PO postcode area. If you're close to a boundary, or somewhere hard to describe, ring and ask instead of guessing.
A mobile service fits Somers Town, a residential suburb: there's no need to take the car to us, because our engineers empty it on the spot, on a driveway, a side street, a car park or a forecourt.
What does AdBlue in a diesel tank cost to sort out around Somers Town?
Each job differs, and so not one single quote would be fair. Whether the motor has run, and for how long, comes first in what changes the cost. How much AdBlue got in comes next, and then the location of the vehicle, because an open driveway is simpler for our van to reach safely than a tight gap behind Somerstown Mural.
What got in, what quantity, and whether it ran: each Somers Town enquiry begins with exactly that, ahead of a quote, never afterwards. Once they are known, a range becomes a single firm number.
Quoted by phone before the van sets out, it is paid for on the day — card or phone, no deposit. Misfuelling cover is part of plenty of insurance policies, so it is worth looking at yours before the van arrives.
In Somers Town and still next to your car?
Then the most useful thing you can do is nothing to the car. Ignition off, motor off, keys out. Petrol in Diesel handles the rest, in Somers Town or anywhere within Hampshire, after you call 0333 366 0103 saying it's AdBlue, roughly what quantity, and if it ran.