Turves Green: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Prevent It?
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave the motor and your ignition off and phone 0333 366 0103. A drain plus a full flush, done right where your car sits around Turves Green, is usually what it takes if found before the engine runs. Nothing happened yet? Below, the rest of the page explains the why it happens and the how to avoid it altogether.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel car need its own filler?
Plenty of modern diesels on the roads about Turves Green and Longbridge carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to your engine. Its own tank holds it, and from there it is sent to your exhaust, and there a spray treats the gas.
There is a filler on every tank. On a lot of motors the two sit side by side under the same flap; on others the AdBlue filler is in your boot or under the bonnet. The diesel side is fuelled at the pump all the time. Someone who has to stop and work out where it goes normally fills the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and much less frequently. The error lives in that gap.
How does AdBlue in your diesel tank take place around Turves Green?
Carelessness rarely explains it. Instead is three things coming up at once.
To start with, the warning. Low AdBlue brings a warning from the car, and running out means limp mode — so a hurried top-up, perhaps before work off West Heath Road, or at The Cavalier on the way home after work.
Then the vehicle is unfamiliar. A hire car, a new motor or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't, and the hand reaches for the cap it would have used on the old one.
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 pour after it has started. West Heath or the heart of Turves Green: it takes the same few seconds either way.
Telling the AdBlue filler from the diesel filler
A couple of seconds is all these take — so check them before you pour anything, on a driveway in Hawkesley or a forecourt in Turves Green.
- The cap. The AdBlue cap is often blue, or marked "AdBlue". The diesel cap normally is not. Read it rather than going by position.
- On many motors, size tells: AdBlue has the smaller filler neck.
- Open the filler flap and check for a label — many motors show which belongs in which filler just there.
- In your boot or under the bonnet: that is where your filler sits if it is not by your diesel cap, and the handbook says which.
- Whoever had it before knows. Check as you pick up a rental or company car — from Northfield's car park, say — not when the warning appears.
Keeping AdBlue out of your diesel tank when you top up
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever around West Midlands that is.
- Park and switch off. Not on a slope, not with the engine running, and not in a rush on the side of The Morelands.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, once you find the AdBlue filler and reading it. Silly, yes, but it does the trick.
- The diesel cap stays on. Where the two sit under a flap, make sure it is closed before lifting the bottle.
- Using the bottle's own spout, tip slowly — and stop when it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Before you start your car, shut the cap and check again that your diesel cap never opened off.
Find during the second or third step that AdBlue went in the wrong tank? That's where you stop. Step five stays out.
Put AdBlue in the diesel tank in Turves Green already?
Then the order of things is short. Don't start the motor. Keep the ignition off as well, since on plenty of diesels switching it on by itself starts your pump. Topping up with diesel won't thin it: rather than mixing, AdBlue sinks to the bottom of your tank, just where fuel is taken from.
At a forecourt — Texaco, Shell or any other — the attendants will normally help roll the vehicle clear, if you ask. Your own drive in Turves Green is the place it should stay.
If the engine has already run, stop as soon as it is safe then switch off. Come off the M5 — under 3 miles out of Turves Green — at the next junction. About how far did it go? Hopping across Turves Green is less work than a trip of under 10 miles to Birmingham, and so tell us.
What happens when our technicians arrive around Turves Green
Outside West Heath Primary School, close to West Heath Community Centre or on your own driveway: wherever your car has stopped, our engineers come to it. Both the work and the quote rest on three answers — what liquid, which amount, and if it's run — so our technicians ask. You hear that quote on the phone, before anyone sets off.
Then the tank is cleared and the fuel system purged thoroughly. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, and so it doesn't wash out on its own — which is why that matters more with AdBlue than with petrol. The filter cleaned or, if it must be, replaced; clean diesel in; and then a check of the car. Next we fire it up and confirm it runs smoothly before we leave.
If the 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 at night. Your insurer usually wants the engineer's report and the VAT invoice, and both are yours at the end. Payment comes on the day, with no deposit. Wrong-fuel cover is part of many insurance policies — and so make use of the wait to check yours.
About Turves Green and where it is
Turves Green is a suburban area in the West Midlands, situated near the River Rea and close to the cities of Birmingham and Wolverhampton. Turves Green has a mix of housing types, but semi-detached homes are predominant, and the area is characterised by its relatively low elevation of 162 metres. Turves Green is located near several other suburban areas, including West Heath, Northfield, and Cofton Common, and is about 5.8 miles from Birmingham city centre. Turves Green is also within commuting distance of London, at around 99.7 miles away.
AdBlue drains in Turves Green and across West Midlands
Throughout B postcodes, our vans covering Turves Green — a residential suburb — work the surrounding places too, Cofton Common and Northfield among them. Our van gets to you fastest with a postcode starting B31 3.
Moving your car isn't needed. A driveway, a lay-by on the way to West Heath Park, a side street near blue plaque: The Austin Village: we drain the car where it sits. Ring and ask rather than assuming if you're near a border, or somewhere hard to explain, like the back of Town and Country.
In short, for Turves Green people
Before you pour, read the cap. Petrol in Diesel drains it on the spot, anywhere across West Midlands, if AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank regardless — so leave the vehicle off then phone 0333 366 0103.