How It Occurs and How to Prevent It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Up Holland
Leave the engine and ignition off then call 0333 366 0103 now — the rest can wait if AdBlue is already in your diesel tank. Around Up Holland, catching it before your motor turns usually means draining and a full flush on the spot. Reading in advance? In that case the rest covers why it happens and what to stop it happening at all.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle: two tanks, two fillers
Not one fluid but two: that's what plenty of newer diesels near Up Holland and Orrell run, with diesel for the engine. Kept in a tank of its own, AdBlue is sprayed into the exhaust stream to clean it.
Separate tanks, different fillers. Under one flap, side by side: that is the arrangement on many cars. Elsewhere, AdBlue's filler sits under the bonnet or in the boot instead. At the petrol pump, your diesel side gets filled constantly. Seldom filled, AdBlue usually goes in from a bottle, tipped by someone who must stop and think what cap it needs. Mistakes happen in that gap between the two.
Up Holland: how AdBlue in the diesel tank occurs
Carelessness rarely explains it. Instead is three things coming up together.
Hurry comes from the warning. The car tells you as AdBlue runs low, and a dry tank puts the vehicle into limp mode — so the top-up gets done quickly, before work on a drive off Tithebarn Street, or on the way home in the car park at The Britannia.
Then, the hand goes for the cap it knew on the old car — because a rental car, a new car or a company car puts the fillers where your last one did not.
A spouted bottle meets no resistance at a diesel filler any more than at an AdBlue one. And so the pour, once begun, carries on. Hall Green or the middle of Up Holland: it is the same few seconds in both.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Check these before pouring, at a forecourt in Up Holland or a drive out in East Pimbo. A few seconds, no more.
- Colour and lettering: an AdBlue cap is commonly blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap normally doesn't. Go by the cap, not where it sits.
- Check the size: the smaller filler neck is, on plenty of vehicles, the AdBlue one.
- Open the flap and check for a label — many vehicles mark which goes in which inlet just there.
- Cannot find it beside the diesel filler? In that case look below the bonnet or inside the boot — the owner's manual says which.
- 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 Orrell.
Topping up AdBlue without it reaching your diesel tank
On the day the light comes on — wherever you are around Lancashire — a routine to follow.
- Stop on level, motor off, with time in hand — not hurried on the side of Bridgehall Drive.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds daft and it does the trick.
- The diesel cap remains on. When the two sit under a flap, make sure it's closed before the bottle comes up.
- Finish once your tank is topped up or the bottle runs dry; before that, tip slowly through the built-in spout.
- Close the cap, and look again — confirm the diesel filler remained closed the whole time. Only then, start your car.
If at stage two or three you find you have already poured into your diesel side, stop there. Never go on to step five.
Put AdBlue in your diesel tank in Up Holland already?
Short list, then. First: your motor stays off. The fuel pump runs on many diesels the moment the ignition is switched on — and so keep it off. Topping up with diesel will not thin it: instead, AdBlue sinks to the bottom of the tank, right where the fuel is taken from.
Ask the attendants to help roll your car away from the petrol pump if you're on a forecourt — the Texaco, the Esso or anywhere else. Leave it where it is if you're on your own drive around Up Holland.
Already run? Stop once it is sensible, then switch off. The next exit means where to come off when you're on the M58, under a mile from Up Holland. Distance matters — a quick hop across Up Holland makes a smaller job than driving under 15 miles towards Liverpool — so say roughly how far it went.
Our arrival in Up Holland, and what occurs next
Wherever the car came to rest, be it by St Thomas the Martyr Voluntary Aided Church of England Primary School, near Artz Centre or on your own drive, the van comes to it. What liquid got in, the quantity, and if it ran: our engineers ask since the answers set both work and quote. You hear that quote on the phone, before anybody heads out.
Then that tank is drained and your system flushed thoroughly. 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. The filter is flushed, or replaced where it needs to be; clean diesel goes in; and the car is tested. After that our technicians fire it up and check it runs correctly before we go.
Most jobs are finished in about half an hour once our engineers get there, provided your motor has not run — and the pumps our engineers use are safe on a busy forecourt yet quiet at night beside a house. Payment happens on the day, not upfront, and you are given the paperwork your insurer wants: an engineer's report and a VAT invoice. It is worth looking at your policy while we travel to you: misfuelling cover comes with many policies.
About Up Holland and where it is
Up Holland is a village in Lancashire, situated on the banks of a river at an elevation of 127 metres. Up Holland lies approximately 13.8 miles from Liverpool and 178 miles from London, with nearby places including Hall Green, Tontine, and Orrell Post. Up Holland has a population of around 3207 people, predominantly living in semi-detached housing. Up Holland is characterized by its riverside setting, which influences the local landscape and environment.
AdBlue drains in Up Holland and across Lancashire
Over WN postcodes, the teams that cover Up Holland — a village — work the surrounding places too, Orrell Post and Tontine among them. Our van reaches you fastest with a postcode starting WN8 0.
No need to shift the vehicle. The drain happens right there, be it a driveway, a road by Upholland Methodist Church, or a layby on the way to Dean Wood Golf Club. Guessing doesn't help at the back of St Thomas the Martyr, on a boundary, or somewhere hard to describe; phone and check.
Up Holland motorists: the short version
Tip nothing till you've read the cap. Petrol in Diesel empties it where it stands, anywhere in Lancashire, if AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank all the same — so leave the vehicle off and ring 0333 366 0103.