Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Southborough
If AdBlue has got into your diesel tank, leave the motor off then keep the ignition off. Urea mixed in water is all AdBlue is. Unlike fuel, it neither ignites nor mixes, and nothing starts until your motor sucks it round. A drain and a thorough flush, done where the car is around Southborough, is usually all AdBlue in a diesel tank takes — if it's caught before your motor has been run. Before anything, ring us on 0333 366 0103.
Southborough, AdBlue in the diesel tank: what to do straight away
Do these:
- Take the keys out, so no one switches the ignition on.
- Close to moving traffic? Then put your hazards on.
- The empty bottle or your receipt shows us the product and the quantity, and so do not bin it out.
- Call just where you are. Say a TN4 0 postcode or the nearest street name, and nobody has to search for you.
Don't:
- Not even briefly, and not to shift your car: the motor remains off.
- Many diesels run their fuel pump the moment your ignition goes on, and so leave it off.
- Adding extra diesel does not help: AdBlue settles out rather than thinning.
- Never drive the vehicle anywhere, not even a short way down Vale Road.
- Beside the road, do not attempt emptying it on your own.
Rolling your car away from the pumps is a job for staff to help with, whichever Southborough forecourt you're on, the Bidborough Service Station or any other. Parked on your own driveway? Then it remains just where it is.
AdBlue in a diesel tank, and what it does there
Meant for the exhaust, AdBlue has no business in the motor. It goes into its own tank and is sprayed into your exhaust gas to clean it. A fuel pump is not made to cope with it, and AdBlue was never intended to go through one.
Inside a diesel tank it behaves really differently from fuel. It does not mix in. It's heavier than diesel, and so it sinks and gathers at the bottom of the tank, which is where the pickup draws fuel from. Once your system runs, the AdBlue is top of the list to go through. Until then it sits underneath your diesel, which is how a vehicle filled in Mabledon yesterday and never started stays the straightforward one, as long as nobody touches the key.
After it's drawn in, the harm comes in two forms. 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 components it reaches for as long as it remains there. Pipes holding AdBlue mean harm overnight for a vehicle sitting around Southborough. Just inside that tank, it stays stable. The water in it does harm of its own: the high-pressure fuel pump and your injectors rely on diesel to lubricate them, and water offers them nothing.
AdBlue in a diesel: why it is frequently worse than petrol
A problem of thin fuel is what you end up with from fuelling a diesel with petrol from the BP. Damage just comes from running on it. Mixed into your diesel and left inside your tank, it does nothing.
AdBlue in a diesel is a problem of the wrong substance altogether. Since it does not burn, running it through is not an option. It does not stay mixed, and so it cannot be thinned. And crystals and corrosion do not wash out with the next tank of fuel. That is why the flush counts more with AdBlue than with petrol, and why starting the engine "to see" costs more here than nearly anywhere else, whether the car is in Stockland Green or the middle of Southborough.
With AdBlue, the good news is no different from petrol. Wherever around Kent your car has stopped, an unrun engine means the AdBlue still inside the reservoir: the simplest bit of any fuel system to empty.
How does AdBlue end up in a diesel tank around Southborough?
No one means to do it. The AdBlue filler on plenty of motors sits right next to the diesel filler, sometimes under the same flap, and the two caps can look alike in poor light. A container picked up while driving home and tipped in at home, instead of at the filling station, is the usual route.
It tends to happen in a few familiar ways. Rushing, outside Southborough CofE Primary School, after a warning light came on during the school run, someone tops up your car. A bottle is poured in at the end of the day on a drive just off London Road. Or a driver new to that flap refills the vehicle after dark, parked in the car park by The Imperial.
It occurs most in the cars motorists know least: a hire car, a new car, a company car, or the second car of a household with one diesel and one petrol. Keep it off: that is the first response to an identical slip, anywhere around Southborough or the remainder of Kent you happen to be.
Started the engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank in Southborough?
Then the AdBlue has left your tank. The fuel filter and pipework have had it sucked along, and any running takes it on to the high-pressure pump and every injector.
You may see your motor running unevenly, smoking, losing power, showing warning lights or cutting out, possibly on the way back from Pennington Grounds or halfway across Southborough. Pull over when it is safe. Turn off. Leave it off instead of testing it again. Each start pulls more of it through.
If you were on the M25, under 10 miles from Southborough, come off at the next junction and stop somewhere sensible instead of pressing on.
Mileage matters: every mile carries the AdBlue deeper into the system, and so driving towards London, under 50 miles away, gives a far larger job than crossing Southborough to the car park by St Dunstan's Catholic Church. Approximately how far had it come? Tell us.
There's more to clean out once the engine has been run, and our engineers do all of it where the car has come to a stop. If it is caught soon, long-term damage is very uncommon.
What draining AdBlue from a diesel involves in Southborough
Our engineers come to your car, wherever it has stopped in Southborough: a side street close to St John's Methodist Church, a drive, a lay-by or a forecourt. What went in, roughly how much, plus whether your engine has turned over: our technicians check before all else, since those decide the job.
Right there, your tank is then emptied, and all of the contaminated diesel and the urea come out as one. The fuel system is flushed thoroughly, which counts more with AdBlue than with petrol, because what it leaves behind does not rinse out on its own. After that, the filter: cleaned, or replaced when it has to be. Then clean diesel, and then a test of the car. If your motor has not run, the majority of jobs take about half an hour once our engineers are there. The pumps are explosion-proof, fine on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark.
Priming the system with fresh diesel comes last. You set off as soon as our technicians have fired it up, and it makes no difference whether your car is on a drive in Southborough or in a bay at High Brooms. The test before our technicians leave is that it runs smoothly on new diesel. We do it all wherever the vehicle has ended up, and it never has to go to a workshop. You get a VAT invoice and an engineer report later on, which is what insurers ask for.
About Southborough itself
Southborough is a town in Kent, situated inland at an elevation of around 115 metres, approximately 29 miles southeast of central London. Southborough has a mix of housing types, but semi-detached homes are particularly prevalent, reflecting the town's development as a residential centre. Southborough is close to several nearby places, including Modest Corner, Bidborough, and High Brooms, and is part of the larger commuter belt around London.
AdBlue drains across Kent, Southborough included
Throughout the TN postcode area, the teams taking AdBlue jobs around Southborough serve most of Kent too, Modest Corner, Bidborough and High Brooms included. Phone and ask rather than guess if you are close to a border, or somewhere tricky to pin down.
A mobile service suits Southborough, a town: you have no need to take your car to us, because we empty it there, in a driveway, a residential street, a parking area or a filling station.
AdBlue in a diesel tank around Southborough: the cost of fixing it
There's no fair single price, since the jobs are not the same. The cost shifts first with how long, if at all, the engine has been running, and next with the quantity of AdBlue that got in. After that it rests on where your car is and whether a van can reach it safely, which is simpler on an open drive than in a tight gap behind St Thomas's Church.
Ahead of a quote, not after, each enquiry from Southborough opens with the same three checks: the fuel, the amount, and whether it ran. Those replies shrink a range right down to one figure.
Priced on the call 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 gets there.
Beside the car around Southborough, right now?
Then, touch nothing — that's the best step there is. Keys out, engine off, ignition off. Petrol in Diesel handles the rest, in Southborough or wherever within Kent, once you ring 0333 366 0103 saying it's AdBlue, about how big an amount, and if it ran.