How It Occurs and How to Avoid It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Southcourt
Keep your motor and ignition off then phone 0333 366 0103 now — the rest can wait when AdBlue is already in your diesel tank. In Southcourt, catching it before the engine turns usually means a drain and a full flush where it stands. Reading before the event? In that case what follows explains why it happens and what to stop it ever happening.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle: two tanks, two fillers
Diesel goes to the motor — yet many modern diesels seen around Southcourt and Aylesbury hold another fluid too. AdBlue's own tank keeps it, and from there it is sent to your exhaust, and there spraying treats the fumes.
Each tank has its own filler. Other vehicles put the AdBlue filler in your boot or under the bonnet; a lot more place both together behind one flap. The diesel side is topped up at the petrol pump all the time. A driver who has to stop and think where it goes normally tops up the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and much less regularly. That gap is where the mistake lives.
AdBlue in your diesel tank in Southcourt: how it takes place
Three things tend to line up, and carelessness is seldom one of them.
Hurry follows from the warning. Your car tells you as AdBlue runs low, and a dry tank sends it into limp mode — so the top-up gets done quickly, before work on a driveway off Churchill Avenue, or heading home in the car park outside The Aristocrat.
Then your car is new. A hire car, a new car or a company car puts the fillers where your last one did not, and the hand reaches for the cap it would have used on the old one.
Third, the spout fits: a diesel filler or AdBlue one, it slides in as easily, and once the pour starts, nothing halts it. The same few seconds settle it, in the middle of Southcourt or out in Walton Court.
The AdBlue filler and the diesel filler: telling them apart
A couple of seconds is all these take — so check them before you pour anything, on a driveway in Sedrup or a forecourt in Southcourt.
- The cap. The AdBlue cap is often blue, or marked "AdBlue". Your diesel cap normally is not. Read it rather than going by where it sits.
- The size. On many motors the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- Look inside your fuel flap: many motors carry a label there saying which fuel goes where.
- Cannot find it beside your diesel filler? Then check beneath the bonnet or inside the boot — the handbook will say where.
- Whoever had it before will know. Check as you collect a hire car or fleet car — at Aylesbury's car park, say — rather than when the warning appears.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching your diesel tank
When the light comes on, anywhere around Buckinghamshire, use this routine.
- Turn off once parked — flat ground, motor stopped, and not rushed beside Vicarage Road on the verge.
- Find the AdBlue filler, read the cap, and say the name "AdBlue" out loud while you unscrew it. It sounds daft. It does the trick.
- Leave the diesel cap on. If both sit under one flap, check your diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle.
- Stop when that tank is topped up or the bottle is empty; before that, pour gently using its own spout.
- Shut the cap, then check once more — confirm your diesel filler stayed shut throughout. After that, start your car.
If at stage two or three you find you have already poured into your diesel side, stop there. Don't go on to step five.
Already put AdBlue in your diesel tank in Southcourt?
Do not start the engine: that is where the short order of things starts. On plenty of diesels your ignition alone runs the fuel pump, and so don't switch it on. Filling up with diesel will not weaken it: instead, AdBlue sinks to the bottom of your tank, just where fuel is drawn from.
If you're on a forecourt, whether it's the Esso or the another forecourt nearby, ask the staff to help push your car clear of the pump. Leave it where it is if you're on your own drive around Southcourt.
Where the motor has been run by now, stop safely and switch the vehicle off. Southcourt lies under 15 miles from the M40; on it, take the first junction. A short hop across Southcourt is a smaller job than a run towards Milton Keynes, under 25 miles away, and so tell us about how far it went.
When our engineers turn up in Southcourt, what takes place?
Anywhere your car came to rest, whether by Ashmead Combined School, beside Church of the Good Shepherd or at home, the van comes to it. Both the work and the price rest on three replies — which liquid, which quantity, and whether it has run — so our engineers ask. The quote is given over the phone, ahead of any van leaving.
Next: draining, then a thorough flush of the whole system. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it does not wash out on its own — which is why the flush matters more with AdBlue than with petrol. The filter cleaned or, if needed, swapped; fresh diesel in; and then a check of your vehicle. Before leaving, our technicians start the car and make sure that it is running smoothly.
If your motor hasn't run, the majority of jobs take about half an hour once we are there, using pumps that are fine on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark. The insurer will ask for the engineer's report and your VAT invoice, and both are yours once the job is done. Payment is on the day, with no deposit. Wrong-fuel cover is part of many insurance policies — and so use the wait to check yours.
About Southcourt itself
Southcourt is a suburban area in Buckinghamshire, situated near the River Great Ouse and characterised by semi-detached housing. Southcourt sits at an elevation of 81 metres, with nearby places including Walton Court, California, and Walton. Southcourt is located close to Milton Keynes, at a distance of approximately 16.7 miles, and is about 36 miles from London.
AdBlue drains across Buckinghamshire, Southcourt included
Throughout HP postcodes, our teams that cover Southcourt — a residential suburb — work the nearby locations too, Walton and California among them. The van gets to you fastest with a postcode starting HP21 8.
Shifting the car is not needed. Our technicians drain it where it is — a side street close to Kingdom Hall, a lay-by on the way to Edinburgh Recreation Ground, a driveway. Ring and ask instead of guessing if you are near a border, or somewhere hard to explain, like the back of Seventh Day Adventist Church Aylesbury.
For Southcourt people, the short version
First, the cap; then, the pour. AdBlue in your diesel tank after all? Leave the car switched off and ring 0333 366 0103; Petrol in Diesel drains it where it stands, throughout Buckinghamshire.