AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Toft: How It Occurs and How to Prevent It
Stop reading a minute if your diesel tank already holds AdBlue in it: ignition off, engine off, then call 0333 366 0103. A drain and a thorough flush, done just where the vehicle stands in Toft, is normally what it needs when caught before your motor runs. Reading in advance? Then the rest explains how it comes about and how to stop it ever happening.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle: two tanks, two fillers
Plenty of modern diesels in Comberton, like those in Toft, run on two liquids; your engine takes just the diesel. Kept in a tank of its own, AdBlue is sprayed into your exhaust stream to clean it.
Each tank comes with one filler of its own. Some cars keep the AdBlue filler in your boot or under the bonnet; a lot of others place both side by side under one flap. Topping up the diesel side at the petrol pump goes on all the time. The AdBlue side is fuelled far less often, normally from a bottle, and usually by a person who has to stop and think where it goes. That gap is where the slip lives.
How AdBlue in the diesel tank happens around Toft
Three things tend to line up, and carelessness is seldom one of them.
First, the warning. Low AdBlue triggers a warning from the vehicle, and letting it run out leads to limp mode — so a rushed top-up, perhaps before work off Comberton Road, or outside the pub in the village on the way home after work.
New-to-you cars are second, as well. Rentals, new cars and company vehicles put their fillers differently, and the hand reaches for the cap it used on the old one.
Nothing stops the pour after it has started, because a bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as readily as an AdBlue one. The bottle fits. It's seconds, be it in Caldecote or right in the heart of Toft.
The AdBlue filler and the diesel filler: telling them apart
Before you pour anything, whether on a driveway in Great Eversden or a forecourt around Toft, check these. They take a few seconds.
- Blue and marking: an AdBlue cap is commonly blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap usually does not. Trust the cap, not where it sits.
- Look at the size: the smaller filler neck is, on plenty of cars, the AdBlue one.
- Check inside the fuel flap: plenty of cars have a label there saying which fuel goes where.
- The handbook says where it is when the filler isn't next to the diesel cap: the boot, or under the bonnet.
- The person who drove it last. On a hire or company car picked up from somewhere like the car park outside Shepreth, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
Keeping AdBlue out of the diesel tank when you top up
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever around Cambridgeshire that is.
- Turn off once parked — level ground, engine stopped, and never rushed beside School Lane on the verge.
- Daft as it sounds, saying "AdBlue" aloud as you unscrew the cap works — once you've located the filler and read it.
- The diesel cap stays on. Where both sit under a flap, confirm it is shut before lifting the bottle.
- Pour slowly, using the bottle's own spout. Stop when it is full or when the bottle is empty.
- Before starting your car, close the cap and check a second time that the diesel cap never came off.
Stop there if you find, at step two or three, that you have already poured into the diesel side. Don't go on to stage five.
AdBlue in your diesel tank already, around Toft?
Don't start your motor: that's where the short order of things starts. Leave the ignition off too, because on many diesels it by itself runs your fuel pump. Filling up with diesel will not weaken it: rather than mixing, AdBlue sinks to the base of that tank, just where fuel is drawn from.
The attendants at BP, Pace or any forecourt will usually help to push the car away when asked. If you are on your own driveway in Toft, leave it where it sits.
If the engine has already run, stop as soon as it is safe then switch off. The next junction is where to come off when you are on the M11, under 5 miles from Toft. Mileage matters — a short hop across Toft is a smaller job than heading under 10 miles towards Cambridge — so say about how far it went.
Our arrival in Toft, and what takes place next
By Meridian Primary School, close to Toft People's Hall or on your own driveway: wherever the car has stopped, our technicians come to it. Which fluid went in, the quantity, and if it ran: our technicians ask because those answers set both work and price. Nobody sets off before you've heard the quote over the phone.
Emptying that tank comes next, followed by a full flush of the system. Not like petrol, AdBlue forms crystals and attacks certain fuel-system metals, and neither clears out by itself. That is why it counts more. Filter flushed or, where it must be, replaced; fresh diesel in; then a test of your vehicle. Before we go, we fire it up and check that it's running correctly.
If your engine hasn't run, most jobs take about half an hour once we're there, using pumps that are safe on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark. You pay on the day, with nothing upfront, and get a VAT invoice and an engineer report for your insurer. While we travel, take a look at your insurance documents; many include cover for misfuelling.
About Toft, briefly
Toft is a small village in Cambridgeshire, situated on the riverside at an elevation of around 40 metres. Toft lies near the city of Cambridge, approximately 5.7 miles to the west, and is surrounded by nearby places such as Caldecote and Kingston. Toft has a population of around 570 people and is characterised by predominantly detached housing. Toft is located within the Eastern region of England, about 47.2 miles from London.
AdBlue drains about Toft, and Cambridgeshire beyond
Being a village, Toft shares its vans surrounding places — Kingston, Claypit Hill — right across CB postcodes and the surrounding area around them. Give a postcode beginning CB23 2, and the van gets there fastest.
Shifting the car is not needed. A driveway, a lay-by on the way to Lot Meadow, a side street near The Church In Toft (Methodist): our engineers drain it where it stands. Assuming doesn't help at the back of St Andrew (Toft Parish Church), on a border, or anywhere hard to describe; phone and check.
Toft people: the short version
Before you tip, read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank anyway, leave the car off then call 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it sits, anywhere in Cambridgeshire.