Avoiding AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Tynant: Why It Happens
Pause reading for a moment if the diesel tank already holds AdBlue in it: ignition off, engine off, then phone 0333 366 0103. Around Tynant, catching it before your engine turns usually leaves draining and a thorough flush where it stands. If you're reading before it has happened, the remainder of this page is about why it occurs and how to make sure it does not.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel car
Plenty of current diesels on the roads round Tynant and Dan Caerlan carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to your engine. Its own tank keeps it, and from there it is sent to your exhaust, and there spraying cleans the fumes.
Each tank has one filler of its own. Some vehicles keep the AdBlue filler in the boot or under the bonnet; plenty of others have both side by side behind one flap. Diesel gets filled on each filling station visit, again and again. Someone who has to stop and think where it goes usually tops up the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and far less frequently. That gap is where the error lives.
How does AdBlue in the diesel tank occur in Tynant?
It is rarely carelessness. Three things tend to line up.
On a driveway off Brynhyfryd before work, or in the car park at Cwm & Llantwit Welfare Hall heading home: that is where the rushed top-up happens. What is the reason for the rush? As AdBlue gets low the vehicle tells you, and if it is empty, limp mode follows.
Then the vehicle is new. A hire car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't, and the hand hits for the cap it would have used on the old one.
A spouted bottle finds no obstacle at a diesel filler no more than at an AdBlue one. So the pour, once started, carries on. The same few seconds decide it, in the middle of Tynant or out in Beddau.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Be it a Tynant forecourt or a driveway over in Llantrisant, take a few seconds over these before any goes in.
- Position can mislead; the cap doesn't. AdBlue ones tend to be blue or bear the word "AdBlue" — diesel ones usually do not.
- Plenty of vehicles fit AdBlue the smaller neck of the two.
- The flap. Look inside the fuel flap for a label. Plenty of motors say there which fuel goes where.
- The handbook. If your filler is not by your diesel cap, it's in the boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- The previous driver knows. Ask when you pick up a rental or company car — from Trefforest's car park, perhaps — rather than once the warning comes on.
How to top up without AdBlue in the diesel tank
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever in Rhondda Cynon Taf that is.
- Stop somewhere level, engine off, with time to spare — not hurried on the side of Parish Road.
- Find the AdBlue filler, check the cap, and say the name "AdBlue" out loud as unscrewing 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.
- Stop once the tank is topped up or the bottle is empty; until then, tip slowly through the built-in spout.
- Only then, start the vehicle: close the cap, check again, and make sure the diesel cap was never opened.
Discover at the second or third stage that the bottle went into the wrong tank? That's where you stop. Never go on to stage five.
Tynant: already put AdBlue in your diesel tank?
Short order, then. Top of that: the engine remains unstarted. Do not switch the ignition on; on many diesels that alone runs the fuel pump. Don't top up with diesel to dilute it: AdBlue does not mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of that tank, where the fuel is drawn from.
At a forecourt — Texaco, Tesco or any other — the staff will normally help push the vehicle clear, if you ask. If you're on your own drive in Tynant, leave it where it stands.
If the engine has already run, stop as soon as it is safe and switch off. Tynant lies under 5 miles from the M4; on it, take the next junction. Distance counts — a quick hop across Tynant makes a smaller job than driving under 10 miles to Cardiff — so say about how far it went.
Tynant: what happens when we arrive
Our technicians come to the vehicle wherever it has stopped, whether that is outside the local primary school, close to Beddau and Tynant Community Library or on your own drive. Both the work and the price depend on three replies — which liquid, which quantity, and whether it has run — so we ask. You get that price by phone, before anybody sets off.
The fuel system is then purged thoroughly, after that tank is emptied. With AdBlue that matters more than with petrol: it crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it does not wash out on its own. Filter cleaned or, if it must be, replaced; fresh diesel in; and then a test of the vehicle. Before we leave, our engineers fire it up and check that it is running correctly.
Most jobs are finished in about half an hour once our technicians get there, as long as the engine hasn't run — and the pumps we use are fine on a busy forecourt yet quiet at night beside a house. Nothing in advance; you settle up that day. At the end, the VAT invoice and the report from the engineer are handed to you for the insurer. Misfuelling cover is part of many insurance policies — and so make use of the wait to check yours.
About Tynant
Tynant is a suburban area in Rhondda Cynon Taf, situated on the banks of a river at an elevation of 113 metres. Tynant lies approximately 9 miles north of Cardiff and is surrounded by nearby communities such as Beddau and Llantwit Fardre. Tynant is characterised by its predominantly semi-detached housing stock, reflecting the residential development of the area. Tynant is part of the wider commuter belt around Cardiff, with easy access to the city centre.
Tynant and Rhondda Cynon Taf: AdBlue drains across the area
Over CF postcodes, the teams that cover Tynant — a residential suburb — work the surrounding locations too, Brynteg and Llantwit Fardre among them. The van reaches you fastest with a postcode starting CF38 2.
No need to shift your car. The drain takes place right there, be it a drive, a road near 1st Newtown Llantwit Scout Hall, or a lay-by towards Station Road Play Area. Assuming doesn't help behind Caerlan Community Hall and The Parish Office, close to a boundary, or anywhere hard to describe; phone and ask.
For Tynant drivers, the short version
Tip no AdBlue until you have read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank regardless, leave the vehicle off then call 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel empties it where it sits, anywhere around Rhondda Cynon Taf.