How It Happens and How to Avoid It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Trumpethill
AdBlue already in your diesel tank? Then put this page down a moment, keep the ignition and engine off, then call 0333 366 0103. A drain and a full flush, done just where the vehicle stands around Trumpethill, is normally what it takes if found before the engine runs. If you're reading before it has happened, the rest of this page is about why it happens and how to make sure it doesn't.
AdBlue in a diesel car, and its separate tank
Diesel goes to your engine — but many modern diesels driven about Trumpethill and Gourock hold another liquid too. The exhaust, not the engine, is where AdBlue ends up: sprayed into the gas to fresh it, from its own tank.
Every tank has a filler of its own. Some vehicles put the AdBlue filler in the boot or under the bonnet; a lot of others place the two side by side under one flap. Diesel goes in on every forecourt call-out, week in, week out. Rarely filled, AdBlue usually goes in out of a bottle, tipped by someone who must stop and think what filler it needs. It's in the gap that the mistake lives.
AdBlue in the diesel tank in Trumpethill: how it occurs
Carelessness rarely causes it. Instead is three things coming up together.
On a driveway off Kirn Drive before work, or in the car park at Montieth's on the way home: that is where the hurried top-up happens. Why the rush? As AdBlue runs low the vehicle warns you, and if it's gone, limp mode follows.
The old car's filler is where the hand goes — but a hire car, a new motor or a company car keeps the fillers elsewhere. That's a second factor: an unfamiliar motor.
And the bottle fits. A bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one, and so nothing stops the tip after it has started. It takes a few seconds, be it out in Midton or bang in the heart of Trumpethill.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Before you tip anything, whether on a drive in Levan or a forecourt in Trumpethill, check these. They take a few seconds.
- The cap. The AdBlue cap is often blue, or marked "AdBlue". The diesel cap normally is not. Read it rather than going by position.
- Check the size: the smaller filler neck is, on plenty of motors, the AdBlue one.
- Open the filler flap and check for a label — many motors mark which belongs in each filler right there.
- The handbook says where it is if the filler isn't next to your diesel cap: the boot, or under the bonnet.
- Ask the person who drove it last — before you leave, not when the light comes on — when you pick up a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park outside Gourock.
Keeping AdBlue out of your diesel tank when you top up
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever in Inverclyde that is.
- Not in a rush on the side of Kirn Gardens, not on a slope, not with the engine running: park then switch off first.
- Find the AdBlue filler, read the cap, and say the word "AdBlue" out loud while you unscrew it. It sounds daft. It works.
- The diesel cap stays on. When the two sit under a flap, confirm it's closed before lifting the bottle.
- Gently does it, through the bottle's own spout, till it is full or the bottle is empty.
- Only after that, start the car: close the cap, check a second time, and make sure your diesel cap was never opened.
Discover at the second or third step that the bottle went in the diesel tank? That is where you stop. Never go on to step five.
Put AdBlue in your diesel tank around Trumpethill already?
Short list, then. Top of that: the engine stays off. Keep the ignition off as well, since on plenty of diesels it alone starts the pump. Do not top up with diesel to thin it: AdBlue does not mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of that tank, where the fuel is pulled from.
If you are on a forecourt, whether it is the BP or the Tesco, ask the attendants to help roll your car clear of the pump. Your own driveway around Trumpethill is where it should stay.
Already started? Pull over once it's safe, then switch off. On the M8, under 15 miles from Trumpethill, that means the next junction. Roughly how far did it go? Crossing Trumpethill is smaller work than a run of under 25 miles to Glasgow, and so tell us.
What occurs when we get there in Trumpethill
Wherever the car came to rest, be it outside the local primary school, near Jubilee Drinking Fountain or on your own drive, our van travels to it. What fluid went in, the amount, and if it ran: our engineers ask because those replies set both work and price. On the phone call itself, you are told our price — ahead of dispatch.
Emptying the tank comes next, then a thorough flush of your system. Not like petrol, AdBlue leaves crystals and eats at certain fuel-system metals, and neither washes out by itself. That is why it matters more. The fuel filter is flushed, or replaced where it needs to be; fresh diesel goes in; and the vehicle is tested. We do not leave until it has been started and is running correctly.
If your motor hasn't run, most jobs take about half an hour once we're there, using pumps that are fine on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark. No money upfront; you settle up that day. At the end, a VAT invoice and the report from the engineer go to you for the insurer. Many insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it's worth checking yours while we're on the way.
About Trumpethill, briefly
Trumpethill is a coastal suburban area in Inverclyde, situated near the cities of Glasgow and Greenock. Trumpethill sits at an elevation of 67 metres, overlooking the Firth of Clyde, and is close to nearby places such as Midton and Ashton. Trumpethill has a mix of residential properties, with flats being the predominant type of housing, and is home to a population of around 2887 people.
AdBlue drains across Inverclyde, Trumpethill included
Ashton and Coppermine are among the places near Trumpethill, a residential suburb, that the same vans cover, over PA postcodes. Quote a postcode beginning PA19 1, and our van gets there fastest.
The car stays put. A driveway, a lay-by on the way to Tower Hill Park, a side street close to Tower Hill: we drain it where it is. If you are close to a boundary, or somewhere hard to describe like the back of Struthers Memorial Church, ring and ask rather than assuming.
For Trumpethill motorists, the short version
First, the cap; after that, the pour. Petrol in Diesel empties it where it stands, anywhere in Inverclyde, if AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank regardless — so leave it off then phone 0333 366 0103.