How It Occurs and How to Prevent It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Sunbury-on-Thames
Pause here a minute when your diesel tank already has AdBlue in it: ignition off, engine off, and call 0333 366 0103. Normally, if the motor hasn't run, it is emptied and thoroughly cleaned where the vehicle sits around Sunbury-on-Thames. Reading before the event? Then the rest covers how it comes about and how to prevent it happening at all.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel car need its own filler?
Many current diesels on the roads about Sunbury-on-Thames and Felthamhill carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to the motor. AdBlue goes to the exhaust, where it is sprayed into the gas to fresh it, and it lives in a tank of its own.
Different tanks, different fillers. Many of cars have a single flap for both, while some put the AdBlue filler to the boot or under the bonnet. Filling your diesel side at the petrol pump goes on all the time. A driver who has to stop and think where it goes usually fills the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and far less frequently. That gap is where the mistake lives.
How AdBlue in the diesel tank happens around Sunbury-on-Thames
It's hardly ever carelessness. Three things tend to line up.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low your car tells you, and if it runs out completely, the car goes into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a driveway off Station Road before work, or in the car park outside The Grey Horse on the way home.
Then, the hand reaches for the cap it knew on the old car — since a rental car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers somewhere your last one did not.
And the bottle fits. A bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one, and so nothing stops the tip once it has started. Sunbury Common or the middle of Sunbury-on-Thames: it takes the same few seconds either way.
The AdBlue filler and the diesel filler: telling them apart
A couple of seconds is all these take — so run through them before you tip anything, on a driveway in Ashford Common or a forecourt around Sunbury-on-Thames.
- Colour and marking: an AdBlue cap is often blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap usually doesn't. Go by the cap, not its position.
- On plenty of cars, the size tells: AdBlue has the smaller filler neck.
- A label inside your fuel flap often shows which fuel goes where, on plenty of vehicles. Look for it.
- The handbook shows which it is when your filler is not next to your diesel cap: your boot, or under the bonnet.
- Collecting a hire or company car, perhaps at the car park at Sunbury? Check with the person who drove it last before you set off, rather than once the light comes on.
How to top up without AdBlue in your diesel tank
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever around Surrey that is.
- Pull in somewhere level, engine off, with time in hand — not rushing on the side of Green Street.
- Daft as it sounds, speaking "AdBlue" aloud while you unscrew the cap works — once you've found your filler and read the cap.
- The diesel cap stays on. Where both share a flap, make sure it is closed before the bottle comes up.
- Using the bottle's own spout, tip slowly — and stop when it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Close the cap and check a second time. Make sure your diesel cap was never opened. Only then start the car.
Discover at the second or third step that AdBlue went into the diesel tank? That is where you stop. Don't carry on to stage five.
Sunbury-on-Thames: already put AdBlue in your diesel tank?
Brief list, then. Top of it: your engine remains off. The fuel pump runs on many diesels as soon as your ignition goes on — and so keep it off. Do not top up with diesel to thin it: AdBlue does not mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of that tank, where the fuel is drawn from.
Ask the staff to help push the vehicle away from the pump if you are at a forecourt — the Tesco, the BP or anywhere else. Your own driveway around Sunbury-on-Thames is where it should stay.
Stop as soon as it is safe and switch off, if your motor has already run. Leave the M3 — under a mile out of Sunbury-on-Thames — at the next junction. A short hop across Sunbury-on-Thames is a smaller job than a run towards Westminster, under 15 miles away, so tell us roughly how far it went.
Sunbury-on-Thames: what takes place when our technicians arrive
Anywhere the car has stopped, be it outside St Ignatius Catholic Primary School, beside Sunbury Library or at home, the van travels to it. The replies settle this work and our price, so we ask what got in, roughly how much, and whether it has run. The price comes over the phone, before any van leaves.
The fuel system is then flushed thoroughly, once that tank is drained. More than with petrol, it counts with AdBlue: the crystals build up, some metals are attacked, and nothing washes out on its own, however long it sits. The filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; fresh diesel goes in; and the vehicle is tested. Before we leave, we start the engine and check that it's running smoothly.
Unrun cars mostly need a half-hour job from arrival. The kit is fine on a busy filling station, and quiet enough for a residential street late at night. Your insurer usually wants an engineer's report and the VAT invoice, and you get both once this job is done. Payment comes on the day, with no deposit. It is worth checking your insurance as the van travels to you: misfuelling cover is included with plenty of policies.
About Sunbury-on-Thames and where it is
Sunbury-on-Thames is a town situated on the River Thames in Surrey, with a low elevation of around 14 metres above sea level. Sunbury-on-Thames has a mix of housing types, but semi-detached homes are particularly prevalent, and the town is located near several notable areas, including Sunbury Common and Kempton Park. Sunbury-on-Thames is close to London, at a distance of approximately 13.9 miles, and is near the city of Westminster, which is about 13.8 miles away.
AdBlue drains in Sunbury-on-Thames and across Surrey
Kempton Park and Sunbury are among the places around Sunbury-on-Thames, a riverside town, that the same vans cover, throughout TW postcodes. Quickest of all: give a TW16 6 postcode to our van.
Your car stays where it is. A driveway, a lay-by on the way to Kempton Cricket Ground, a side street near St Saviour: our technicians drain the car where it is. If you're close to a border, or somewhere hard to describe like the back of The Loyola Centre & Nursery, ring and ask instead of assuming.
For Sunbury-on-Thames people, the short version
Read the cap before you pour. Even so AdBlue in the diesel tank? Petrol in Diesel will drain it where it stands, wherever around Surrey: keep it off and phone 0333 366 0103.