Avoiding AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in St Thomas: Why It Occurs
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave your motor and the ignition off and call 0333 366 0103. Around St Thomas, finding it before the motor runs usually leaves a drain and a full flush where it stands. The rest of this page explains why it happens and how to make sure it doesn't — handy if you're reading before it has happened.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle: two tanks, two fillers
Many modern diesels around Port Tennant, like those in St Thomas, carry on two liquids; the engine gets only the diesel. Its own tank keeps it, and from there it goes to your exhaust, and there a spray cleans the fumes.
Every tank comes with one filler of its own. Many of vehicles share a single flap for both, while others put the AdBlue filler to the boot or under the bonnet. Diesel gets filled at each filling station call-out, week in, week out. The AdBlue side is filled far less commonly, normally from a bottle, and normally by someone who has to stop and think where it goes. Mistakes happen in that gap between the two.
St Thomas: how AdBlue in the diesel tank happens
Seldom is it carelessness: usually three things line up.
On a driveway off Port Tennant Road before work, or in the car park at Village Pub and Grill heading home: that's where the hurried top-up takes place. Why the rush? As AdBlue runs low your car tells you, and once it's gone, limp mode follows.
The old car's filler is where your hand reaches — yet a hire car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers somewhere else. That is a second factor: a new car.
A spout-topped bottle meets no obstacle at a diesel filler no more than at an AdBlue one. So the pour, once begun, keeps on. Whether it takes place in Dan-y-graig or the middle of St Thomas, it's the same few seconds.
Telling the AdBlue filler from your diesel filler
A couple of seconds is all these take — so check them before you pour anything, on a driveway in Hafod or a forecourt in St Thomas.
- Where it sits misleads; the cap doesn't. AdBlue ones are often blue or carry the name "AdBlue" — diesel ones normally don't.
- The size. On plenty of motors the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- Open the flap and check for a label — many vehicles show what belongs in which inlet just there.
- The handbook shows where it lives if the filler isn't next to the diesel cap: your boot, or under the bonnet.
- The person who drove the car last. On a hire or company car collected from somewhere like the car park outside Swansea, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach your diesel tank
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever in Swansea that is.
- Stop on level, motor off, with time to spare — not rushing on the side of Fabian Way.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds daft and 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.
- Finish once that tank fills or the bottle is empty; until then, pour gently using the own spout.
- Before starting your car, close the cap and check again that your diesel cap never came off.
Discover during the second or third stage that the bottle went in the diesel filler? That's where you stop. Don't go on to step five.
AdBlue in the diesel tank already, around St Thomas?
Short order, then. Top of that: the engine stays off. On many diesels the ignition alone runs the fuel pump, so do not switch the vehicle on. Don't top up with diesel to dilute it: AdBlue does not mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of the tank, where your fuel is pulled from.
On a forecourt — Sainsbury's, Burrows Service Station or any other — the staff will normally help push your car away, if you ask. Your own drive in St Thomas is where it should stay.
Already run? Pull over when it is sensible, then switch off. The next exit is the place to leave if you're on the M4, under 5 miles from St Thomas. Tell us roughly how far it went: a run towards Swansea, under a mile away, is a bigger job than a short hop across St Thomas.
When we get there in St Thomas, what occurs?
Our van comes to the car wherever it stopped — your own drive, near Saint Thomas's, or outside the local primary school. We ask what got in, roughly how much, and whether it has run, because the replies determine this work and our price. No one heads out until you have had our quote by phone.
Next: a drain, then a full flush of the entire system. More than with petrol, it counts here: the crystals build up, some metals corrode, and nothing clears away on its own, no matter how long it sits. The filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and your car is tested. Before we leave, our engineers fire it up and make sure that it is running correctly.
Using pumps safe on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night, most jobs in which the motor hasn't run take roughly half an hour once our engineers are there. Nothing in advance; you settle up that day. Afterwards, a VAT invoice and a report from the engineer go to you for the insurer. It is worth looking at your insurance while we travel to you: misfuelling cover comes with many policies.
About St Thomas
St Thomas is a suburban area in Swansea, situated near the coast and approximately 0.7 miles from the city centre. St Thomas has a relatively low elevation of 14 metres and is characterised by predominantly terraced housing. St Thomas is close to nearby places such as Dan-y-graig and Foxhole, and is part of the wider Swansea urban area.
AdBlue drains in St Thomas and across Swansea
St Thomas is a residential suburb, and our teams that cover it also work the towns near it, Foxhole and Swansea among them, across the SA postcode area. Quote a postcode that starts SA1 8, and the van arrives quickest.
No need to shift your car. Wherever it stands — beside St Thomas Library, in a lay-by en route to Jersey Park, at home — that's where it is drained. If you're close to a boundary, or somewhere hard to describe like the back of Saint Thomas Community Centre, ring and ask instead of guessing.
The short version for St Thomas people
Always, the cap; after that, the tip. Petrol in Diesel drains it on the spot, anywhere across Swansea, if AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank all the same — and so leave it off then call 0333 366 0103.