AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in The Bratch: How It Occurs and How to Avoid It
Leave the engine and ignition off then ring 0333 366 0103 first — reading can wait when AdBlue is already in the diesel tank. A drain and a thorough flush, done just where your vehicle stands in The Bratch, is normally what it takes when found before your engine runs. If you're reading before it has happened, the rest of this page is about why it occurs and how to make sure it does not.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel motor
No single liquid but two: that's how many modern diesels around The Bratch and Blakeley carry, with diesel for your motor. Your exhaust, not the engine, is where AdBlue ends up: sprayed into the gas to clean them, from its own tank.
There's a filler for each tank. Plenty of cars have a single flap for the two, while others move the AdBlue filler to the boot or under the bonnet. Diesel gets filled on every forecourt visit, again and again. Someone who has to stop and think where it goes usually tops up the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and much less frequently. It is in the gap that the mistake happens.
How does AdBlue in the diesel tank occur around The Bratch?
Seldom is it carelessness: normally three things coincide.
On a drive off Bratch Common Road before work, or in the car park outside Mount Pleasant on the way home: that is where the rushed top-up happens. What is the reason for the rush? As AdBlue gets low the car warns you, and once it is gone, limp mode kicks in.
Then the vehicle is unfamiliar. A hire car, a new motor or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't, and your hand hits for the cap it would have used on the old one.
A spouted bottle meets no resistance at a diesel filler any more than at an AdBlue one. And so the tip, after begun, carries on. Whether it happens in Ounsdale or the middle of The Bratch, it is the same few seconds.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Be it a The Bratch forecourt or a driveway over in Brickbridge, take a few seconds on these before anything is poured in.
- Colour and lettering: an AdBlue cap is regularly blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap usually doesn't. Go by the cap, not where it sits.
- Many cars fit AdBlue the smaller neck of the two.
- The flap. Look inside the fuel flap for a label. Plenty of cars say there which fuel goes where.
- The handbook says where it is if the filler is not next to your diesel cap: your boot, or under the bonnet.
- Picking up a hire or company car, say at the car park at Wolverhampton? Ask whoever drove the car last before you set off, rather than when the light comes on.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching the diesel tank
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever across Staffordshire that is.
- Turn off after you park — level ground, motor off, and not in a rush beside Tollhouse Way at the roadside.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, after finding the AdBlue filler and reading it. Silly, yes, yet it works.
- The diesel cap stays on. When the two sit under a flap, make sure it's shut before lifting the bottle.
- Pour slowly, using the bottle's own spout. Stop when it is full or when the bottle is empty.
- Close the cap and check once more. Make sure the diesel cap was never opened. Only then start the vehicle.
Spot at step two or three that it's already gone into the diesel side? Then stop right there. Don't carry on to stage five.
Already put AdBlue in your diesel tank in The Bratch?
The short order of things, starting with not starting the motor. Keep the ignition off too, since on plenty of diesels switching it on alone runs your pump. Filling up with diesel won't thin it: rather than mixing, AdBlue drops to the bottom of your tank, just where the fuel is taken from.
Ask the staff to help push your car clear of the petrol pump if you are on a forecourt — the Texaco, the Esso or anywhere else. Your own drive in The Bratch is the place it should stay.
Where the engine has been run by now, pull over somewhere safe and turn the vehicle off. Leave the M54 — under 10 miles out of The Bratch — at the next junction. Tell us about how far it went: a run towards Wolverhampton, under 5 miles away, is a bigger job than a short hop across The Bratch.
Our arrival in The Bratch, and what happens next
Our technicians come to the vehicle wherever it has stopped, whether that's outside Westfield Primary School, near Wombourne Leisure Centre or on your own driveway. Our engineers ask what got in, about how much, and if it has run, since the answers settle the work and the price. You hear that quote by phone, before anyone sets off.
The fuel system is then cleaned thoroughly, after your tank is cleared. More than with petrol, it matters with AdBlue: the crystals form, some metals corrode, and nothing washes out unaided, however long it is left. The filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; fresh diesel goes in; and the vehicle is tested. The motor is started next and checked to confirm it runs properly, all before our technicians leave.
Most jobs are finished in roughly half an hour once we arrive, provided your engine hasn't run — and the pumps we use are safe on a live forecourt yet quiet at night beside a house. You pay on the day, with nothing upfront, and get a VAT invoice and an engineer report for your insurer. While we travel, have a look at your insurance documents; plenty include cover for misfuelling.
About The Bratch, for a moment
The Bratch is a suburban area located on the riverside in Staffordshire, with a mix of detached housing and a population of around 2002 residents. The Bratch sits at an elevation of 87 metres, approximately 4.3 miles from Wolverhampton, and is near other local places such as Ounsdale, Wombourne, and Giggetty. The Bratch is positioned in the West Midlands region, about 113.4 miles northwest of London.
AdBlue drains across Staffordshire, The Bratch included
The Bratch is a residential suburb, and our teams that cover it also work the towns near it, Wombourne and Giggetty among them, across the WV postcode area. Quote a postcode beginning WV5 8, and our van gets there quickest.
Your car stays where it is. The drain takes place on the spot, whether a driveway, a street near Maypole, or a layby on the way to Beacon Cricket Club. Tricky to pin down, like the back of Wombourne Library? Close to a county line? Checking is better than guessing, and so ring.
For The Bratch people, the short version
Read the cap before you tip. Petrol in Diesel drains it on the spot, anywhere across Staffordshire, if AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank all the same — and so leave the car off then call 0333 366 0103.