AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Toome: How It Happens and How to Avoid It
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave the motor and the ignition off then call 0333 366 0103. In Toome, catching it before the engine runs usually means a drain and a thorough flush where it stands. Here before the event? Then the rest covers why it happens and how to stop it ever happening.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle, and its separate tank
Many newer diesels in Grange Corner, as well as Toome, run on two fluids; the motor gets only the diesel. AdBlue goes to your exhaust, where it is sprayed into the gas to fresh it, and it lives in a tank of its own.
Every tank has a filler of its own. Some cars keep the AdBlue filler in your boot or under the bonnet; plenty more have the two together under one flap. Topping up the diesel side at the pump happens all the time. Someone who has to stop and think where it goes usually fills the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and much less frequently. Mistakes happen in the gap between them.
Toome: how AdBlue in your diesel tank occurs
It is rarely carelessness. Three things tend to line up.
First, the warning. Low AdBlue brings a warning from the car, and letting it run out leads to limp mode — hence a rushed top-up, perhaps before work off Wallace Cottages, or outside the pub in the village on the way home after work.
The old car's filler is where the hand goes — but a hire car, a new car or a company car keeps the fillers elsewhere. That's the second factor: a strange car.
A spouted bottle finds no obstacle at a diesel filler no more than at an AdBlue one. So the tip, once started, carries on. It takes seconds, whether out in Creagh or right in the heart of Toome.
Telling the AdBlue filler from the diesel filler
Look at these before pouring, at a forecourt in Toome or a drive over in Ballyronan. A few seconds, no more.
- Check the cap instead of going by where it sits: AdBlue caps are regularly blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel caps normally are not.
- On plenty of vehicles, the size tells: AdBlue gets the smaller filler neck.
- A label inside the fuel flap often says which fuel goes where, on many motors. Look for it.
- The handbook. If the filler isn't by the diesel cap, it's in your boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- Collecting a hire or company car, say at the car park at the nearest station? Check with whoever drove the vehicle last before leaving, not once the light comes on.
Keeping AdBlue out of your diesel tank when you top up
On the day the light appears — anywhere it is around County Antrim — a simple routine to use.
- Pull in on level, motor off, with time to spare — not hurried on the side of B842.
- Locate the AdBlue filler, check the cap, and say the word "AdBlue" aloud while you unscrew it. It sounds silly. It does the trick.
- Both behind a single flap? Then make sure the cap on your diesel filler stays shut ahead of raising the bottle.
- Using the bottle's own spout, tip slowly — and stop when it is full or the bottle is empty.
- Before starting your car, shut the cap and check again that the diesel cap never came off.
If at step two or three you find you have already poured into the diesel side, stop there. Stage five is off limits.
AdBlue in your diesel tank already, around Toome?
Brief list, then. Top of that: your engine remains off. On plenty of diesels your ignition alone runs the fuel pump, and so do not switch the vehicle on. Do not top up with diesel to thin it: AdBlue does not mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of your tank, where the fuel is sucked from.
On a forecourt — the nearest petrol station, another forecourt nearby or any other — the staff will normally help roll your car away, when you ask. On your own drive in Toome? Then the car remains put.
Where your motor has been run by now, pull over somewhere safe then switch it off. Leave the M77 — over 50 miles out of Toome — at the next junction. A short hop across Toome is a smaller job than a run towards Belfast, under 25 miles away, so tell us roughly how far it went.
What happens when our engineers turn up in Toome
Wherever your car has stopped, be it by the local primary school, beside the centre or at home, our van travels to it. Our engineers ask what was put in, roughly how much, and whether it has run, because those answers determine this work and the price. You get that quote by phone, before anyone sets off.
The fuel system is then purged thoroughly, once that tank is emptied. More than with petrol, it counts with AdBlue: the crystals build up, certain metals are attacked, and nothing clears away on its own, however long it sits. Filter cleaned or, where needed, swapped; clean diesel in; then a check of the car. We don't leave until it has been started and is running smoothly.
Most jobs are done in roughly half an hour once our technicians arrive, provided your motor has not run — and the pumps our engineers use are safe on a busy forecourt and quiet at night outside a house. Your insurer will ask for an engineer's report and the VAT invoice, and both are yours once this job is done. Payment comes on the day, with no money upfront. Wrong-fuel cover is part of plenty of insurance policies — so make use of the wait to check yours.
About Toome itself
Toome is a small locality in County Antrim, situated inland at an elevation of 16 metres, approximately 23 miles northwest of Belfast. Toome is characterized by its semi-detached housing and is located near several other small communities, including Creagh, Ballymaguigan, and Moneyglass. Toome has a population of around 1027 people and is part of the wider Belfast commuter belt.
AdBlue drains round Toome, and County Antrim beyond
Toome is a small village, and our teams that cover it also work the places around it, Ballymaguigan and Moneyglass among them, across the BT postcode area. A postcode starting BT41 3 gets our van to you fastest.
The vehicle does not need to move. We drain it where it is — a side street close to a street just off the centre, a lay-by on the way to the green space at the edge of the village, a drive. Awkward to explain, like the back of the far end of the built-up part? Close to a border? Asking is better than assuming, and so ring.
The short version for Toome people
Read the cap before you pour. AdBlue in the diesel tank regardless? Leave the car off then call 0333 366 0103; Petrol in Diesel drains it on the spot, throughout County Antrim.