Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Tile Hill
Engine off, ignition off: that is where you start if AdBlue has gone into the diesel tank. AdBlue is urea dissolved in water. As it is water-based, it won't burn and never combines with diesel; damage only comes when the pump begins drawing it. In Tile Hill, AdBlue in a diesel tank caught before the motor runs normally means a drain and a thorough flush, just where the car is. Nothing comes before ringing 0333 366 0103.
What to do right now, Tile Hill: AdBlue in your diesel tank
Do:
- Keys out — then no one can power anything on.
- Hazards on, if moving traffic is anywhere close.
- Keep the receipt or the empty bottle, so you can tell us what was put in and roughly how much.
- Call us from where you are. A postcode starting CV4 9, or the name of the closest street, gets the van to you without a search.
Do not do these:
- Do not start the engine, even for a moment to shift your car.
- The ignition remains off: on lots of diesels, switching it on is enough to start your fuel pump.
- Pouring in more diesel doesn't help: AdBlue settles out rather than blending.
- Leave it where it is instead of driving it anywhere, even a short way down Gravel Hill.
- No draining it yourself, at all, on the roadside.
Get the people behind the counter to help you move the car away from the pumps if you're on a forecourt in Tile Hill, whether it is the Pace or somewhere else. On that drive, your car stays just as it is.
What does AdBlue do in a diesel tank?
Not your engine but your exhaust is where AdBlue is meant to go. Its own tank holds it, and from there it is fed into the exhaust, and there it cleans the gas. A fuel pump is not made to cope with it, and AdBlue was never intended to go through one.
It doesn't combine. After it is poured into a tank of diesel, AdBlue behaves not at all like diesel. Heavier than diesel, it sinks and pools underneath it — the very spot the pickup draws from. A vehicle topped up on a driveway in Upper Eastern Green yesterday evening and not started since is the straightforward case. Nothing has sucked the AdBlue up yet — though when your motor turns, that is what goes first, straight from the bottom of the tank.
From there it does two kinds of damage. As its water goes, the urea left behind crystallises, and the crystals block filters and settle in fine passages. And it's corrosive to some of the metals a fuel system is made from, and so it keeps working on the components it reaches for as long as it remains there. A car left standing around Tile Hill with AdBlue already in its lines is worse by the morning; one with AdBlue just in its tank is not. Diesel protects the injection pump and every injector as it flows; water offers none of that, which is a second kind of damage.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel regularly the bigger fault?
Put petrol in a diesel at the Texaco and you have a problem of thin fuel. Damage only comes from running on it. Blended into the diesel and sitting inside that tank, it causes none.
AdBlue in a diesel is another matter: not thin fuel, yet no fuel at all. Since it does not burn, running it through is not an option. Nor can it be thinned, because it splits again — and the following tankful won't rinse away crystals or corrosion. So the flush matters for more with AdBlue, and turning your key "to see", in the centre of Tile Hill or out in Reeves Green, does more harm than almost any other error.
With AdBlue, the good news is no separate from petrol. Clearing a tank is the easiest part on a fuel system, and with no start-up, the AdBlue remains in there — wherever around West Midlands your car sits.
Tile Hill: how AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank
It's not deliberate. Plenty of vehicles keep the AdBlue inlet alongside the diesel inlet, now and then behind a single flap, and muddling them up is easy after dark. 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. Midway through the drop-off, the dashboard warns, and outside Our Lady of the Assumption Catholic Primary School the top-up is rushed. In the evening, a bottle is tipped in on a drive near Tile Hill Lane. Else, after dark by The Auction House, your vehicle gets refilled by a driver opening that flap for the first time.
It comes up most in a rental, a brand-new vehicle, a fleet motor, or the spare car of a home with both fuel types — the vehicles people know least. Wherever you are around Tile Hill or the remainder of West Midlands, it is the same mistake and the same first answer: leave the vehicle off.
Tile Hill: started the engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank?
The AdBlue has left the tank, then. Your filter and lines have had it sucked along, and some running time takes it on to the injection pump and each injector.
Expect lumpy running, smoke, falling power, warnings on the dash, or a stall — coming back from Pig Wood, say, or midway across Tile Hill. Stop when it is safe. Switch off. Keep the vehicle off instead of restarting it to check. Each start pulls more of it through.
Exit the M6, under 5 miles from Tile Hill, at the first junction and stop safely, rather than driving on.
Hopping across Tile Hill to the car park by Our Lady of the Assumption is one thing; driving for Coventry, under 5 miles away, is another, because each mile pushes the AdBlue deeper in. So distance matters. Approximately how far had it come? Tell us.
There is more to rinse out once the motor has run, and we do all of it where your car has come to a stop. If it's caught soon, permanent damage is very rare.
Tile Hill: how AdBlue is emptied from a diesel
Our technicians come to your car, wherever it has stopped in Tile Hill: a side street close to Tile Hill Library, a drive, a lay-by or a forecourt. What got in, about the quantity, and whether your motor has turned over: our engineers check first, since those decide the job.
Then your tank is emptied where the car waits, so the tainted fuel and the AdBlue come out together. Residue from AdBlue won't wash out by itself, so the whole system gets a careful flush, which matters far more with urea than for petrol. Clean diesel goes in after the filter is flushed — or replaced, if it needs to be — and then your vehicle is tested. Not run? Then expect about half an hour once we are there for most jobs. The equipment is explosion-proof, so a live forecourt is no problem, and it is quiet enough for a residential street after dark.
New diesel goes in to bleed your system, and that is the last step. At that point we fire it up and you set off, whether from a parking space at the nearest station or a driveway around Tile Hill. Before we leave, our engineers confirm it's running properly with clean diesel in. The entire job is done where the car is, so it never needs to go to a garage. Insurers ask for a VAT invoice and an engineer report, and you get both afterwards.
About Tile Hill, briefly
Tile Hill is a suburban area in the West Midlands, situated near the River Sowe and close to the city of Coventry. Tile Hill has a mix of housing types, but is predominantly composed of flats, and is located near several local parks and green spaces, including Lime Tree Park. Tile Hill sits at an elevation of 131 metres, and is part of the larger Coventry urban area. Tile Hill is connected to nearby areas, including Lower Eastern Green and Hockley, and is within commuting distance of major cities like London, which is approximately 88 miles away.
Tile Hill and West Midlands: AdBlue drains across the area
Lime Tree Park, Lower Eastern Green and Hockley are among the towns around Tile Hill that the same teams serve, together with most of West Midlands further out, throughout the CV postcode area. Phone and check instead of guessing when you are close to a border, or anywhere awkward to pin down.
Wherever your vehicle sits — your driveway at home, a residential street, a parking area, a filling station — our technicians drain it on the spot, and there's no need to bring it to us; that suits Tile Hill, a residential suburb, well.
AdBlue in a diesel tank in Tile Hill: the cost of fixing it
Not one flat figure would be fair, since each job is different. Whether the motor has run, and for how long, comes first in what shifts the price. How much AdBlue was put in comes next, and then the location of your car, since an open drive is simpler for our van to get to safely than a tight space behind St Oswald CoE Church.
Which fluid was put in, how much, plus if it ran: every Tile Hill enquiry begins by asking precisely that, before a figure, never after. Given them, the range shrinks to one firm number.
You hear that quote by phone, before anybody heads out, and you pay on the day, by card or by phone, with nothing upfront. As the van is on the way, dig out your insurance: many include misfuelling.
Still alongside the vehicle around Tile Hill?
Right now, the most helpful thing to do with your car is to leave it. Ignition off, engine off, keys out. Say it's AdBlue, about what quantity, and whether the engine ran, on 0333 366 0103. From there Petrol in Diesel handles it, across Tile Hill or anywhere in West Midlands.