Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Tuckingmill
Motor off, ignition off: that's how you begin if AdBlue has gone into your diesel tank. AdBlue is urea dissolved in water. The trouble starts once it is pulled through the lines — it won't burn, and it will not combine with diesel. In Tuckingmill, AdBlue in a diesel tank caught before your motor runs usually means a drain and a thorough flush, just where the car is. First, ring us on 0333 366 0103.
What to do straight away, Tuckingmill: AdBlue in your diesel tank
To do:
- Pull your keys out, so no one switches your ignition on.
- Hazards on, if moving traffic is anywhere close.
- Hold on to your receipt or the empty bottle, so you can tell us what got in and about how much.
- Ring just where you are. Say a SP3 6 postcode or the closest street sign, and nobody has to hunt for you.
Do not:
- No starting the motor — not briefly, not to reposition your car.
- Plenty of diesels power their pump the instant the ignition goes on, so keep the vehicle off.
- Pouring in extra diesel does not work: AdBlue settles out rather than blending.
- Keep the vehicle where it is rather than driving it anywhere, even a short way down Hatch Lane.
- No draining it yourself, at all, on the roadside.
The attendants on duty at any Tuckingmill filling station — the Esso among them — will normally lend a hand rolling it clear if you ask. Parked on your own driveway? Then it remains exactly where it is.
What AdBlue does in a diesel tank
Made for the exhaust, AdBlue has no place in the engine. Kept in a dedicated tank, it is squirted into the exhaust to treat the gases. Neither side fits the other: urea doesn't belong in an injection pump, and an injection pump can't take urea.
Inside a diesel tank it acts very differently from fuel. It doesn't mix in. It's heavier than diesel, so it sinks and gathers at the bottom of your tank, which is where the pickup sucks fuel from. Easiest of all: a vehicle that had AdBlue in Wardour last night and hasn't been started since. The AdBlue sits at the base of that tank, untouched — but it would be the first thing through if your engine runs, ahead of any diesel at all.
It does two kinds of harm from there. It eats at some metals found in fuel systems, attacking whatever it touches till it is removed from your system. And when the water goes, the urea turns into crystals that clog filters and settle in narrow channels. Where the AdBlue has reached the lines, leaving it till morning around Tuckingmill makes things worse. In that tank alone, time costs nothing. Then there's the water: it brings no protection to the parts that need it the most — the high-pressure pump and every injector.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel frequently the bigger issue?
Petrol pumped into a diesel on another forecourt nearby's forecourt leaves your fuel watery — that is the main problem. It mixes with your diesel, and while it's in your tank it causes no damage; the harm comes from running your engine on it.
AdBlue in a diesel is a fault of the wrong substance altogether. Not burning, it can't simply be run through. Whether your vehicle is in Newtown or the centre of Tuckingmill, turning it over "to see" does more harm in this case than almost any other mistake, and the flush matters for more. Why: it will not stay blended, so diluting it is impossible; and crystals and corrosion survive the next fill.
The same good news holds as with petrol. If the motor has not run, the AdBlue is still in that tank, and your tank is the easiest part of a fuel system to clear, wherever around Wiltshire the car is sitting.
Tuckingmill: how AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank
After dark, two caps together — the AdBlue one and the diesel cap, occasionally behind a single flap — may appear the same. Nobody intends it; many layouts allow it. Mostly it takes place with a bottle bought on the way home and poured in on the driveway, not at the pump.
It tends to happen in a few familiar ways. Hurrying, outside St John's Church of England Primary School, Tisbury, after a warning lamp came on during the school run, a parent tops up the car. After work, a container goes in on a drive close to Monmouth Road. Another pattern: darkness, a pub car park outside The Benett Arms, and someone using that flap for the first time.
It occurs most in the vehicles people know least: a hire car, a new motor, a company car, or the second vehicle of a household with one diesel and one petrol. An identical slip, an identical first step — leave it off — anywhere you are in Tuckingmill or the rest of Wiltshire.
Already started your engine with AdBlue in your diesel tank in Tuckingmill?
The AdBlue has left your tank, then. It's been drawn through the fuel filter and your lines, and if your engine ran for any time, it has reached the high-pressure pump and your injectors.
You may see the motor running roughly, smoking, losing power, showing warning lights or cutting out, maybe on the way back from Community Field or halfway across Tuckingmill. No restarting to check: stop once it is safe, then turn everything off. With each start, more of that is pulled through.
If you were on the M27, under 25 miles from Tuckingmill, come off at the next junction and stop somewhere safe rather than pressing on.
A quick hop across Tuckingmill to the car park by Nadder Centre is one matter; heading for Salisbury, under 15 miles away, is another, because every mile pushes the AdBlue further in. So mileage matters. Let us know about how far it had come.
Once the engine has been started, the flush takes in more, and all of it is done where the car has come to a stop. When it is caught quickly, lasting damage is very rare.
What clearing AdBlue from a diesel involves around Tuckingmill
A street by St John the Baptist, a driveway, a lay-by or a forecourt: wherever your vehicle has come to rest in Tuckingmill, we come to it. The work rests on three answers, and our engineers get before all else — what went in, the amount, and whether the engine has turned over.
The polluted diesel and the urea leave as one after your tank is emptied, on the spot. With AdBlue, more so than with petrol, the flush matters: the whole system is flushed all the way through since what remains will not wash out by itself. Fresh diesel goes in after the fuel filter is cleaned — or swapped, if it needs to be — and then the car is tested. Roughly half an hour on site is typical for most jobs when your engine has not run. The equipment is explosion-proof, so a live filling station is no issue, and it's quiet enough for a residential street after dark.
The final step is to bleed the system on fresh diesel. You head off as soon as our engineers have fired it up, and it makes no difference whether the vehicle is on a driveway in Tuckingmill or in a space at Tisbury. The test before we head off is that it runs properly on clean diesel. No workshop is needed at any stage, with the entire job done then and there. You get a VAT invoice and an engineer report afterwards, which is what insurers want.
About Tuckingmill
Tuckingmill is a suburban area in Wiltshire, situated near the riverside and surrounded by rolling countryside. Tuckingmill sits at an elevation of 137 metres, approximately 12.9 miles from Salisbury and 90.3 miles from London. Tuckingmill is characterized by its predominantly detached housing stock, with nearby villages including Tisbury, East Hatch, and West Hatch.
AdBlue drains across Wiltshire, Tuckingmill included
Tisbury, East Hatch and West Hatch are among the places near Tuckingmill that the same teams reach, together with much of Wiltshire further out, throughout the SP postcode area. If you're close to a border, or somewhere hard to explain, ring and ask instead of assuming.
Wherever your vehicle stands — a driveway at home, a residential street, a car park, a forecourt — our engineers empty it there, with no need to bring it to us; which suits Tuckingmill, a residential suburb, well.
Tuckingmill: what AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to fix
There is no honest single price, since the jobs are not the same. The price changes first with how long, if at all, the engine has been running, and next with the quantity of AdBlue that was put in. After that it turns on where the vehicle is and whether a van can get to it safely, which is simpler on an open drive than in a tight spot behind Methodist Church.
Ahead of a figure, not after, every call from Tuckingmill opens with the same three questions: the fuel, the amount, and whether it ran. The replies turn a range into a straight price.
The quote is given during the call, before anyone leaves; payment comes on the day, by card or over the phone, with nothing upfront. Look at your insurance whilst we're on the way: plenty carry misfuelling cover.
In Tuckingmill and still next to the vehicle?
Then, do nothing — that is the best step available. Motor off, keys out, ignition off. Say it was AdBlue, roughly how big an amount, and if it ran, on 0333 366 0103. From there Petrol in Diesel takes over, in Tuckingmill or anywhere within Wiltshire.