Avoiding AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Trosnant: Why It Occurs
Stop reading for a moment when the diesel tank already has AdBlue in it: ignition off, motor off, and phone 0333 366 0103. Normally, if the engine has not turned, it's drained and thoroughly flushed where your car sits in Trosnant. The rest of this page explains why it happens and how to make sure it doesn't — handy if you're reading before it has happened.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel car
Many modern diesels on the roads around Trosnant and Cwmynyscoy carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to the motor. Kept in a tank of its own, AdBlue is sprayed into the exhaust stream to clean it.
Every tank comes with a filler of its own. Other vehicles put the AdBlue filler in the boot or under the bonnet; a lot of others have the two side by side behind one flap. At the petrol pump, your diesel side gets filled all the time. The AdBlue side is filled far less regularly, usually from a bottle, and normally by a person who has to stop and think where it goes. Mistakes happen in the gap between them.
How does AdBlue in your diesel tank take place in Trosnant?
It is hardly ever carelessness. Three things tend to line up.
First, the warning. Low AdBlue brings a warning from the vehicle, and letting it run out leads to limp mode — hence a rushed top-up, perhaps before work off Park View, perhaps at The Unicorn on the way home after work.
The old car's filler is where your hand goes — yet a rental car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers elsewhere. That is a second thing: a strange motor.
Third, the bottle fits: a diesel filler or AdBlue one, it slides in just as easily, and once the tip begins, no part halts it. The same few seconds decide it, in the middle of Trosnant or out in Cwm Fields.
Which filler is for AdBlue, and which for diesel?
Check these first, on a forecourt around Trosnant or a drive out in Sowhill. Seconds, that's all.
- Read the cap rather than going by where it sits: AdBlue ones are regularly blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel caps usually are not.
- On plenty of motors, size gives it away: AdBlue has the smaller filler neck.
- Look inside your fuel flap: plenty of cars have a label there saying which fuel goes where.
- Cannot see it next to your diesel inlet? Then look beneath the bonnet or inside the boot — the handbook says which.
- Check with the person who drove it last — before you leave, not when the light comes on — if you collect a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park outside Pontypool and New Inn.
Keeping AdBlue out of the diesel tank when you top up
Anywhere around Torfaen the light comes on, this is a routine for that day.
- Park and switch off. Not on a slope, not with the engine running, and not in a rush on the side of A472.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, after you find the AdBlue filler and reading it. Silly, yes, but it does the trick.
- If both sit under one flap, check your diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — and leave it on.
- Finish once the tank is topped up or the bottle is empty; until then, pour gently through the built-in spout.
- Shut the cap, then check again — making sure your diesel cap stayed closed throughout. After that, start the car.
Stop there if you find, at stage two or three, that you have already poured into the diesel side. Don't go on to stage five.
Trosnant: already put AdBlue in the diesel tank?
Do not start the motor: that is where the short order of things begins. The fuel pump starts on many diesels the moment your ignition is switched on — so keep it off. Filling up with diesel will not thin it: instead, AdBlue sinks to the bottom of the tank, right where fuel is drawn from.
At a forecourt — Tesco, Esso or any other — the staff will usually help roll your car away, if you ask. If you are on your own drive around Trosnant, leave the car where it sits.
Stop as soon as it is safe and switch off, if your engine has already run. Leave the M4 — under 10 miles out of Trosnant — at the first exit. A short hop across Trosnant is a smaller job than a run towards Newport, under 10 miles away, so tell us roughly how far it went.
Trosnant: what takes place when we arrive
We come to the vehicle wherever it has stopped, whether that is outside the local primary school, close to Pontymoile Undenominational Christian Mission or on your own drive. Both the work and our price rest on three answers — what fluid, what amount, and whether it has run — so our engineers ask. On the call itself, you are told our price — before anything else.
Your system is then rinsed thoroughly, after the tank is cleared. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, and so it does not wash out on its own — which is why the flush matters more here than with petrol. The filter is flushed, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and your car is tested. Your engine is started next and checked to be sure it runs correctly, all before our technicians go.
With pumps safe on a working forecourt and quiet enough for use outside a house at night, most jobs in which the engine hasn't run take roughly half an hour after we are there. Nothing in advance; you settle up on the day. At the end, the VAT invoice and the report from the engineer go to you for the insurer. While we travel, have a look at your policy; plenty carry cover for misfuelling.
About Trosnant and where it is
Trosnant is a suburban area in Torfaen, situated on the riverside with a mix of semi-detached housing. Trosnant sits at an elevation of 144 metres, close to the nearby communities of Cwm Fields and Pontymoel. Trosnant is located near the city of Newport, which is approximately 7.8 miles away. Trosnant has a population of around 2339 residents.
AdBlue drains across Torfaen, Trosnant included
Being a residential suburb, Trosnant shares its vans nearby areas — Pontymoel, Pontypool — all the way through NP postcodes and the wider area beyond. Quote a postcode that starts NP4 5, and the van arrives fastest.
Shifting the car isn't needed. The drain happens on the spot, be it a drive, a street by Canolfan Byw'n Egnïol Pont-y-pŵl, or a layby on the way to Pontypool Park. Ring and ask instead of assuming if you're close to a border, or somewhere hard to describe, like the back of Hanbury Arms Haunted Hotel & Museum.
The short version for Trosnant people
Before you tip, read the cap. Petrol in Diesel empties it where it stands, anywhere in Torfaen, if AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank regardless — so leave the vehicle off and phone 0333 366 0103.