How It Happens and How to Prevent It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Thongsbridge
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave the engine and your ignition off then phone 0333 366 0103. Around Thongsbridge, catching it before the engine turns normally leaves a drain and a full flush on the spot. Here before the event? Then what follows covers why it happens and what to stop it happening at all.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel motor
Not one liquid but two: that is what plenty of newer diesels around Thongsbridge and Netherthong carry, with diesel for your motor. AdBlue goes to your exhaust, where it is sprayed into the gas to clean it, and it lives in a tank of its own.
Different tanks, different fillers. Under one flap, side by side: that is the layout on a lot of vehicles. On others, AdBlue's filler is beneath the bonnet or in the boot instead. 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 commonly. The mistake lives in that gap.
AdBlue in your diesel tank in Thongsbridge: how it takes place
Three things tend to come together, and carelessness is rarely one of them.
To start with, the warning. Low AdBlue triggers a message from the vehicle, and running dry leads to limp mode — so a hurried top-up, maybe before work off Heys Road, or outside Wooldale Arms on the way home after work.
New-to-you motors are second, too. Hire cars, new motors and company motors put their fillers in new places, and habit reaches for the cap it used on the old one.
A spout-topped bottle meets no obstacle at a diesel filler any more than at an AdBlue one. And so the pour, once begun, keeps on. Whether it happens in Town End or the middle of Thongsbridge, it is the same few seconds.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
A few seconds is all these take — so check them before you tip anything, on a drive in Cliff or a forecourt around Thongsbridge.
- The cap. The AdBlue cap is frequently blue, or marked "AdBlue". Your diesel cap normally is not. Read it instead of going by where it sits.
- The size. On plenty of vehicles the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- Look inside your fuel flap: plenty of vehicles have a label there saying which fuel goes where.
- The handbook says which it lives if your filler is not 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 at Brockholes, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching your diesel tank
Wherever across West Yorkshire the light comes on, this is a routine for the day.
- Switch off after you park — level ground, motor off, and not in a rush beside Mill Race Fold on the verge.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds daft and it works.
- Leave the diesel cap on. If both sit under one flap, check the diesel cap is still closed before you lift 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 your diesel cap was never opened. Only then start the vehicle.
If at stage two or three you find you have already poured into the diesel side, stop there. Do not go on to step five.
Thongsbridge: already put AdBlue in your diesel tank?
Short list, then. First: the motor stays unstarted. On many diesels your ignition alone runs the fuel pump, and so don't switch the vehicle on. AdBlue does not mix with diesel — it sinks to the bottom of the tank, where your fuel is drawn from — so don't top up with diesel to thin it.
At a forecourt — Murco, Texaco or any other — the staff will normally help push the car clear, if you ask. At home in Thongsbridge? So the vehicle remains where it is.
Where the motor has been run already, stop somewhere safe and turn the vehicle off. The next exit means where to come off when you are on the Outlane Interchange, under 10 miles from Thongsbridge. About how far did it go? Hopping across Thongsbridge is less work than a trip of under 15 miles to Wakefield, so tell us.
Our arrival in Thongsbridge, and what occurs next
By New Mill Infant School, near Thongsbridge Tennis & Fitness Club or on your own drive: wherever the vehicle has stopped, we come to it. Those answers decide the work and the price, and so our technicians ask what was put in, about how much, and whether it has run. During the call itself, you hear the price — before anything else.
The system is then rinsed thoroughly, after the tank is cleared. With AdBlue that matters more than with petrol: it crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it doesn't wash out on its own. A test is last: before that, fresh diesel goes in, and the filter is cleaned or changed if necessary. We don't leave until it has been fired up and is running smoothly.
Most jobs are finished in roughly half an hour once our engineers get there, provided your motor has not run — and the pumps our engineers use are fine on a busy forecourt yet quiet at night outside a house. Nothing upfront; you settle up on the day. Afterwards, a VAT invoice and a report from the engineer go to you for your insurer. Before we get there, have a look at your insurance documents; plenty include cover for misfuelling.
About Thongsbridge, briefly
Thongsbridge is a village situated in a riverside location in West Yorkshire, with a population of around 2207 people. Thongsbridge has a mix of housing types, but is predominantly characterised by detached homes. Thongsbridge sits at an elevation of 170 metres, near to the communities of Town End, Wooldale, and Lydgate. Thongsbridge is located approximately 13 miles from Wakefield and 159 miles from London.
AdBlue drains round Thongsbridge, and West Yorkshire beyond
Thongsbridge is a village, and the teams that cover it also work the towns around it, Wooldale and Lydgate among them, across the HD postcode area. Give a postcode beginning HD9 7, and the van arrives quickest.
There's no need to shift the car. The drain happens on the spot, whether a drive, a street by Wooldale Methodist Free Church, or a lay-by towards Sycamore Recreation Ground. Ring and ask instead of assuming if you're close to a boundary, or somewhere hard to explain, like the back of Wooldale Community Centre.
For Thongsbridge people, the short version
Before you pour, read the cap. AdBlue in the diesel tank regardless? Keep it off then ring 0333 366 0103; Petrol in Diesel empties it where it stands, across West Yorkshire.