AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in The Cape? Don't Start It
If AdBlue has got into the diesel tank, keep your engine off then leave your ignition off. AdBlue is urea dissolved in water. As it is water-based, it won't ignite and never combines with diesel; damage only comes when your pump starts pulling it. A drain and a thorough flush, done where the car is around The Cape, is generally what AdBlue in a diesel tank needs — if it is caught before your motor has run. Before anything, phone us on 0333 366 0103.
What to do right now, The Cape: AdBlue in your diesel tank
Things to do:
- Remove the keys, and that prevents someone turning the power on.
- If you are at all near moving traffic, put the hazards on.
- Which product, and roughly what quantity? Hang on to the bottle or the receipt, and we will see.
- Ring us from where you are. A postcode starting CV34 5, or the name of the closest street, gets the van to you without a search.
Do not:
- Shifting your vehicle even a short way is no reason to start your motor.
- Turning the key to ignition alone starts the pump going on many diesels. Skip it.
- Do not top up with diesel to thin it. AdBlue doesn't mix in diesel; it separates out.
- Do not drive it anywhere, not even a short distance down Cape Road.
- Do not try to drain it yourself at the kerbside.
Moving the car away from the pumps is a job for staff to help with, whichever The Cape forecourt you're on, the BP or any other. On your own driveway, don't touch it at all.
What does AdBlue do in a diesel tank?
The engine isn't what AdBlue is made for; your exhaust is. From a dedicated tank it goes straight to the exhaust, cleaning what the engine emits. Nothing in a fuel pump is designed for this fluid — and none of that was intended to go that way.
Inside a diesel tank it behaves really differently from fuel. It doesn't mix in. The intake takes fuel from the lowest part of the tank, and that is just where AdBlue settles: as it is denser than diesel, it sinks. A car filled on a drive in Guys Cliffe yesterday evening and not started since is the straightforward case. Nothing has sucked the AdBlue up yet — but once the motor runs, that's what is pulled first, straight from the bottom of your tank.
Two kinds of damage follow from there. Crystals and corrosion. As the water dries, it leaves urea that hardens in filter elements and narrow channels; and, because it eats at certain metals, every part it reaches keeps suffering for as long as it stays inside. By daybreak, a vehicle parked around The Cape with AdBlue through its pipework gets worse; where it is only inside your tank, it doesn't. And there is the water: it offers no lubrication to the parts that rely on it the most — the injection pump and each injector.
Petrol or AdBlue in a diesel: why AdBlue is regularly worse
Petrol pumped into a diesel on Esso's forecourt leaves the fuel watery — that's the whole issue. No harm is done as long as it stays put, blended into your diesel — only once your engine works on it.
AdBlue in a diesel is a different problem: not thin fuel, but no fuel at all. It does not burn, and so it can't just be run through. Nor can it be thinned, because it splits back out — and the next tankful will not rinse away crystals or corrosion. So the flush matters more with AdBlue, and turning your key "to see", in the heart of The Cape or out in Cliff Hill, costs more than nearly any other slip.
The good news is the same as with petrol. Never started? Then the AdBlue sits only in your tank, the easiest bit of the whole system to clear, wherever your vehicle has come to rest in Warwickshire.
How AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank in The Cape
No one means to do it. The AdBlue filler on many motors rests right next to your diesel filler, at times under the same flap, and the two caps can look alike in poor light. Mostly it happens with a bottle bought on the way home and poured in on the driveway, not at the forecourt.
The ways it occurs are few and familiar. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up takes place in a hurry outside Woodloes Primary School. A bottle is poured in at the end of the day on a drive just off Lower Cape. Else, in dim light outside Cape of Good Hope, the car gets topped up by someone using that flap the first time.
It comes up the most in a hire car, a new motor, a fleet motor, or the spare car of a home with one of each fuels — the vehicles drivers use least. Same slip, an identical first step — keep it switched off — wherever you happen to be around The Cape or the rest of Warwickshire.
Started the motor with AdBlue in the diesel tank in The Cape?
Then the AdBlue has left your tank. Via the filter, along the lines, and — given any running time — into the high-pressure pump and every injector: that is where it has gone.
Expect lumpy running, smoke, lost power, warnings on the dash, or a stall — returning from Saltisford Common, say, or midway across The Cape. No starting it again to test: stop once safe, then turn it off. Every start pulls more of that through.
The Cape lies under 3 miles from the M40; if you were on it, leave at the next junction and pull up safely instead of driving on.
How far it went counts. A few hundred yards across The Cape to the car park by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is a very different job from a run towards Coventry, under 10 miles away, with the AdBlue reaching further into the system with each mile. Let us know roughly how far it had come.
There's more to rinse out once the motor has been started, and we do all of it where the car has stopped. When it is caught early, long-term damage is very unusual.
What does an AdBlue drain on a diesel involve in The Cape?
Anywhere it has stopped in The Cape — a forecourt, a lay-by, a drive, a road by Kingdom Hall of Jehovah's Witnesses — our van comes to your car. Three replies decide the job, and so before anything else we ask what got in, about what quantity, and if your motor has run.
Then your tank is emptied where the car stands, so the contaminated fuel and the AdBlue come out together. Residue from AdBlue will not wash away unaided, so the whole system gets a careful flush, which matters far more with urea than with petrol. Your filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; fresh diesel goes in; and your car is tested. Not run? Then count on about half an hour once we are there for most jobs. The pumps are explosion-proof, fine on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night.
Bleeding your system with clean diesel comes last. Whether it is a parking bay outside Warwick or a drive around The Cape, that is where our engineers start it and you drive off. It is checked on clean diesel to be sure it runs correctly before our engineers go. As the job is done in full where the car is, a garage never comes into it. At the end, there is paperwork for the insurer: a VAT invoice plus a report from the engineer.
About The Cape itself
The Cape is a suburban area in Warwickshire, situated on the riverside with a mix of terraced housing. The Cape sits at an elevation of 63 metres, approximately 9 miles from Coventry and near other local places such as Packmores and Woodloes Park. The Cape is part of the larger West Midlands region, within commuting distance of major cities and about 82.7 miles from London.
AdBlue drains across The Cape and Warwickshire
The teams that answer AdBlue calls around The Cape also cover the places around it, Packmores, Warwick and Woodloes Park among them, and most of Warwickshire beyond, across the CV postcode area. Near a border, or somewhere awkward to pin down? Asking beats guessing, so ring.
The Cape is a residential suburb, and a mobile drain suits it: whether the car is on a home drive, a residential street, a car park or a forecourt, we drain it where it sits, so it never needs to be shifted to us.
What does AdBlue in a diesel tank cost to sort out around The Cape?
Every job differs, and so no single quote is honest. Three things shift the price: whether your engine has run and for how long, how much AdBlue got in, and where the vehicle is. That last one comes down to whether a technician can get to it safely, and an open driveway is easier than a tight space behind Northgate Methodist Church.
With that in mind, every enquiry from The Cape opens by asking the same trio — which fluid was put in, what quantity, if the engine ran — ahead of any figure. Those replies turn a range into a straight price.
Quoted on the call before the engineer heads out, it is settled on the day — card or phone, nothing in advance. While the van is travelling, dig out your insurance: many include misfuelling.
The Cape: still next to the vehicle?
Leaving your vehicle alone is, right now, the best move open to you. Keys out; motor and ignition off. Ring 0333 366 0103 and tell us it is AdBlue, roughly how much, and whether it's run. Petrol in Diesel takes it from there, in The Cape or anywhere around Warwickshire.