South Hatfield: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Avoid It?
Leave the engine and ignition off and ring 0333 366 0103 first — the rest can wait when AdBlue is already in your diesel tank. A drain plus a full flush, done just where the car sits around South Hatfield, is usually what it takes when caught before the engine runs. The rest of this page covers why it takes place and how to make sure it doesn't — useful if you're reading before it has happened.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle, and its separate tank
Many modern diesels on the roads around South Hatfield and Roe Green carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to your engine. AdBlue goes to your exhaust, where it is sprayed into the gas to fresh it, and it lives in a tank of its own.
Each tank has its own filler. Other motors keep the AdBlue filler in your boot or under the bonnet; a lot more place the two together under one flap. The diesel side is fuelled at the pump all the time. Someone who has to stop and think where it goes normally tops up the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and far less often. The mistake grows in that gap between them.
AdBlue in the diesel tank around South Hatfield: how it takes place
Rarely is it carelessness: usually three things line up.
Hurry follows from the warning. The vehicle warns you as AdBlue runs low, and a dry tank puts it into limp mode — so the top-up gets done in a rush, before work on a drive off Hazel Grove, or heading home in the car park at Hatfield Tap.
New-to-you motors come second, as well. Rentals, new motors and company motors put their fillers in new places, and habit goes for the cap it used on the old one.
A spout-topped bottle finds no resistance at a diesel filler any more than at an AdBlue one. And so the pour, once begun, carries on. Whether it happens in Oxlease or the middle of South Hatfield, it is the same few seconds.
Telling the AdBlue filler from the diesel filler
Before you tip anything, whether on a drive in Ellenbrook or a forecourt in South Hatfield, check these. They take a couple of seconds.
- Where it sits misleads; the cap does not. AdBlue caps are often blue or carry the name "AdBlue" — diesel ones usually do not.
- Plenty of motors fit AdBlue the smaller neck of the two.
- Open the flap and check for a label — plenty of cars mark which goes in each filler right there.
- The handbook. If your filler is not by the diesel cap, it is in your boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- The person who drove the vehicle last. On a hire or company car collected from somewhere like the car park at Hatfield, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching the diesel tank
Wherever across Hertfordshire the light comes on, this is a routine for that day.
- Park and switch off. Not on a slope, not with your motor running, and not in a rush on the side of High View.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, once you find the AdBlue filler and reading it. Silly, perhaps, but it works.
- Leave the diesel cap on. If both sit under one flap, check the diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle.
- Pour slowly, using the bottle's own spout. Stop when it's full or when the bottle is empty.
- Only after that, start your car: close the cap, check again, and make sure your diesel cap was never opened.
If at stage two or three you find you have already poured into the diesel side, stop there. Skip step five altogether.
Already put AdBlue in the diesel tank in South Hatfield?
What follows is a short order of things, starting with not starting the motor. Leave the ignition off as well, because on many diesels switching it on by itself starts the fuel pump. Filling up with diesel won't weaken it: rather than mixing, AdBlue drops to the bottom of the tank, just where the fuel is drawn from.
The attendants at Gulf, Day Bros or another forecourt will normally help to push your car clear if you ask. Leave it where it is if you're on your own drive in South Hatfield.
If your motor has already run, stop as soon as it is safe then switch off. South Hatfield sits under a mile from the A1(M); on it, use the next exit. A short hop across South Hatfield is a smaller job than a run towards St Albans, under 5 miles away, so tell us roughly how far it went.
When we arrive in South Hatfield, what occurs?
Outside De Havilland Primary School, near Hilltop Community Centre or on your own driveway: wherever the vehicle has stopped, our technicians come to it. Both the work and the quote depend on three replies — what liquid, which quantity, and whether it has run — so we ask. On the call itself, you are told our quote — ahead of anything else.
Emptying that tank comes next, then a thorough flush of the system. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it doesn't wash out on its own — which is why the flush counts more here than with petrol. Your filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; fresh diesel goes in; and the vehicle is tested. We do not leave until it has been started and is running correctly.
Using pumps safe on a busy forecourt and quiet enough for use outside a house at night, most jobs where the engine has not run need about half an hour after our engineers arrive. Payment happens on the day, not upfront, and you receive the documents your insurer asks for: an engineer's report and a VAT invoice. Misfuelling cover is part of plenty of insurance policies — and so use the wait to look at yours.
About South Hatfield and where it is
South Hatfield is a suburban area in Hertfordshire, situated approximately 17 miles north of London and 4 miles east of St Albans. South Hatfield sits at an elevation of around 107 metres, with its terraced housing stock reflecting the typical residential architecture of the region. South Hatfield is bordered by nearby places such as Oxlease, Bullens Green, and Nast Hyde, and has a population of around 10,454 residents.
AdBlue drains across Hertfordshire, South Hatfield included
Being a residential suburb, South Hatfield shares its vans surrounding areas — Bullens Green, Nast Hyde — all the way through AL postcodes and the wider area beyond. A postcode starting AL10 9 gets the van to you fastest.
Shifting your car is not needed. The drain takes place right there, be it a drive, a street by The Hive @ the Jim McDonald Centre, or a layby towards Campus Accommodation Green. If you're near a border, or somewhere hard to describe like the back of St Johns Church, ring and ask rather than assuming.
The short version for South Hatfield motorists
First, the cap; then, the tip. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank anyway, leave the car off and call 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel clears it where it waits, anywhere across Hertfordshire.