AdBlue in the Diesel Tank in Tidbury Green? Keep It Switched Off
AdBlue in the diesel tank? Then keep your engine off — and your ignition as well. Chemically, AdBlue is just urea in water. Being water-based, it will not ignite and won't blend with diesel; trouble only comes once your pump begins pulling it. A drain and a thorough flush, done where the vehicle is around Tidbury Green, is generally what AdBlue in a diesel tank takes — if it is caught before your motor has run. Before anything, call us on 0333 366 0103.
Tidbury Green, AdBlue in your diesel tank: what to do right away
To do:
- Keys out — then no one can power anything on.
- Hazards on, if moving traffic is anywhere near.
- The empty bottle or the receipt shows us the fluid and the amount, so do not throw it away.
- Ring right where you are. Say a B90 1 postcode or the nearest street sign, and nobody has to hunt for you.
Things not to do:
- Do not start the motor, even for a moment to shift the vehicle.
- Do not switch your ignition on. On many diesels that alone runs the fuel pump.
- No more fuel added. The AdBlue will not mix, and so it is wasted.
- Any driving at all is best avoided, including a short stretch up Dickens Heath Road.
- No draining it yourself, either, on the verge.
On a forecourt in Tidbury Green, whether it's the JET or another one, ask the staff to help you push your car away from the pump. Parked on your own driveway? Then it remains just where it is.
AdBlue in a diesel tank, and what it does there
AdBlue is made for your exhaust, not your motor. From a separate tank it is fed directly to your exhaust, treating what your motor lets out. Not one side fits the other: urea does not belong in an injection pump, and a pump can't deal with urea.
Poured in with the diesel, it keeps separate instead of mixing — entirely different from fuel. Heavier than diesel, it drops and pools below it — the same spot the pickup draws from. A motor filled on a driveway in Grimes Hill overnight and left unstarted is the simple case. Nothing has sucked the AdBlue up so far — but when the motor turns, that is what goes first, straight from the bottom of the tank.
Two kinds of harm follow from there. It attacks certain metals found in fuel systems, working on whatever it reaches till it is removed from your system. And when the water evaporates, the urea turns into crystals that block filters and settle in narrow channels. Lines carrying AdBlue mean damage by morning for a vehicle sitting in Tidbury Green. Just in that tank, it stays the same. Then there is the water: it offers no protection to the parts that rely on it the most — the high-pressure pump and each injector.
Why AdBlue in a diesel is frequently more serious than petrol
A fault of thinned fuel is what you end up with from filling a diesel with petrol at the Murco. No harm comes as long as it stays unused, mixed into your diesel — only when your motor runs on it.
With AdBlue in a diesel, the fluid itself is simply the wrong one. Because it doesn't burn, running it through isn't an option. Crystals and corrosion stay after the next fill, and AdBlue separates back from your diesel, so thinning it can't help. Hence the flush counts more, and trying the engine "to see" does more harm with AdBlue than almost any other mistake — in Drakes Cross or the centre of Tidbury Green equally.
The same good news applies as with petrol. If the motor hasn't run, the AdBlue is still in that tank, and that tank is the easiest part of a fuel system to clear, wherever around West Midlands the car is sitting.
Tidbury Green: how AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank
In dim light, two caps side by side — the AdBlue cap and the diesel cap, now and then under a single flap — can appear the same. Nobody means it; plenty of designs allow it. It mostly occurs at home, from a bottle bought en route home, rather than at the forecourt.
It tends to take place in a couple of familiar ways. The refill is rushed outside Tidbury Green School, after your dash flashed with a warning as the children were taken off. Someone pours the bottle in at home, just off Tilehouse Lane, as the day ends. Otherwise, after dark outside Morton's Kitchen Bar & Deli, your car gets topped up by a driver using that flap for the first time.
It happens most in the cars people know least: a hire car, a new motor, a company car, or the second car of a household with one diesel and one petrol. Anywhere around West Midlands, Tidbury Green as well, the mistake does not change, and nor does the first response: leave it off.
Tidbury Green: started the engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank?
The AdBlue has left the tank, then. Through your filter, through the pipework, and — given any running — on to the high-pressure pump and each injector: that's where it has gone.
Rough running, smoke, dropping power, dashboard warnings or cutting out: any might show up, perhaps part way across Tidbury Green or coming back from Tidbury Green Golf Course. When you safely can, pull over and switch it off — with no turning it on again to see. Each start pulls more of it through.
Tidbury Green lies under 3 miles from the M42; if you were on it, exit at the first junction and pull up safely instead of carrying on.
How far it went matters. A few hundred yards across Tidbury Green to the car park by St John the Divine is a very different job from a run towards Birmingham, under 10 miles away, with the AdBlue reaching further into the system with every mile. Roughly how far it had come is worth telling us.
There's more to rinse out once your engine has run, and we do all of it where the vehicle has come to a stop. Caught quickly, it very rarely leaves lasting damage.
Tidbury Green: how AdBlue is drained from a diesel
The car stays where it is, whether that is a street near Earlswood Methodist Church, a driveway, a lay-by or a forecourt around Tidbury Green, and our van comes to it. What got in, about the quantity, plus if your motor has been run: our technicians check before all else, because those shape the job.
The contaminated diesel and the urea leave as one after the tank is drained, on the spot. The fuel system is rinsed thoroughly, which counts more with AdBlue than with petrol, since what it leaves behind does not rinse out on its own. Fresh diesel goes in after your filter is cleaned — or replaced, when it needs to be — and after that your car is tested. The majority of these jobs are a half-hour job once our engineers arrive, if your engine hasn't run. The pumps are explosion-proof, safe on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night.
Bleeding the system with new diesel comes last. You head off as soon as our engineers have fired it up, and it makes no difference whether the vehicle is on a drive in Tidbury Green or in a space outside Wythall. Our engineers make sure it runs correctly on clean diesel before we go. Our technicians do it all wherever your car has ended up, and it never needs to be taken to a garage. You receive a VAT invoice and an engineer report later on, which is what insurers ask for.
About Tidbury Green
Tidbury Green is a village in the West Midlands, situated near the River Blythe and close to the cities of Birmingham and Solihull. Tidbury Green has a mix of old and new housing, with predominantly detached homes, and is surrounded by other small villages such as Rumbush and Whitlocks End. Tidbury Green sits at an elevation of 157 metres, giving it a relatively high vantage point in the area. Tidbury Green is located approximately 7 miles south of Birmingham city centre, making it a commuter-friendly location.
Tidbury Green and West Midlands: AdBlue drains across the area
Our vans that answer AdBlue calls in Tidbury Green also cover the places around it, Rumbush, Whitlocks End and Dickens Heath among them, and most of West Midlands beyond, across the B postcode area. If you are close to a border, or somewhere hard to describe, ring and ask rather than guessing.
A van that comes to you suits Tidbury Green, a village: you have no need to take your car to us, since we empty it on the spot, in a driveway, a residential street, a parking area or a filling station.
AdBlue in a diesel tank in Tidbury Green: the cost of fixing it
Not one single price would be fair, because each job differs. What moves the price is, first, whether the engine has been running and for how long; then how much AdBlue went in; and then where your car is and whether a technician can reach it safely, which is easier on an open driveway than in a tight space behind Dickens Heath Library.
Ahead of any quote, never afterwards, each enquiry from Tidbury Green opens with the same three questions: the liquid, the quantity, plus if the engine ran. With them, the range shrinks to one fixed number.
You get that quote by phone, before anyone heads out, and you pay on the day, by card or by phone, with nothing upfront. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, and so it's worth checking yours while we're on the way.
Still next to the vehicle in Tidbury Green?
Leaving your vehicle alone is, then, the most useful move you can do. Keys out, engine off, ignition off. Petrol in Diesel takes over the remainder, in Tidbury Green or wherever in West Midlands, once you call 0333 366 0103 to say it's AdBlue, about what quantity, and if the engine ran.