Upper Tysoe: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Avoid It?
Stop reading for a moment when your diesel tank already holds AdBlue in it: ignition off, engine off, then ring 0333 366 0103. A drain and a thorough flush, done right where your vehicle sits in Upper Tysoe, is normally all it takes if caught before your engine runs. If you are reading before it has happened, the rest of this page is about why it happens and how to make sure it doesn't.
Two fillers, two tanks: AdBlue in a diesel motor
Many modern diesels on the roads round Upper Tysoe and Winderton carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to your engine. AdBlue's own tank keeps it, and from there it goes to the exhaust, where spraying treats the gas.
There's a filler for every tank. Other cars put the AdBlue filler in the boot or under the bonnet; a lot of others place both together behind one flap. At the pump, your diesel side is topped up constantly. The AdBlue side is topped up far less often, normally from a bottle, and usually by a person who has to stop and think where it goes. The slip lives in that gap.
Upper Tysoe: how AdBlue in your diesel tank occurs
It's seldom carelessness. Three things tend to line up.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low the car tells you, and if it runs out completely, the vehicle goes into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a driveway off Walnut Pladdocks before work, or in the car park at The Peacock on the way home.
Then the car is unfamiliar. A hire car, a new car or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't, and your hand gets to for the cap it would have used on the old one.
Lastly, the spout goes in: diesel filler or AdBlue one, it slides in just as readily, and once the tip starts, nothing stops it. Middle Tysoe or the middle of Upper Tysoe: it takes the same few seconds either way.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
A few seconds is all the checks take — so run through them before you tip anything, on a driveway in Sun Rising or a forecourt around Upper Tysoe.
- The cap. The AdBlue cap is frequently blue, or marked "AdBlue". Your diesel cap usually is not. Read it instead of going by where it sits.
- Look at the size: the smaller neck is, on many cars, the AdBlue one.
- Check inside your fuel flap: many cars carry a label there showing which fuel goes where.
- The handbook shows where it is when your filler isn't next to the diesel cap: the boot, or under the bonnet.
- The person who drove the car last. On a hire or company car picked up from somewhere like the car park outside Banbury, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
How to top up without AdBlue in your diesel tank
When the light comes on, wherever across Warwickshire, follow this routine.
- Not in a rush on the side of Shipston Road, not on a slope, not with the motor running: park then switch off first.
- Locate the AdBlue filler, read the cap, and say the name "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It seems daft. It does the trick.
- The diesel cap stays on. Where the two sit under a flap, make sure it's closed before lifting the bottle.
- Slowly does it, through the bottle's own spout, till it is full or the bottle runs out.
- Shut the cap, and look again — making sure the diesel cap stayed closed the whole time. Only then, start the vehicle.
Find at step two or three that it has already gone into your diesel side? So stop right there. Never go on to step five.
Put AdBlue in the diesel tank in Upper Tysoe already?
Then the order of things is short. Don't start the engine. Leave your ignition off as well, since on plenty of diesels switching it on alone runs the fuel pump. Filling up with diesel won't weaken it: rather than mixing, AdBlue sinks to the bottom of that tank, just where fuel is drawn from.
If you're on a forecourt, whether it is the The Forge Garage or the Murco, ask the staff to help push the vehicle away from the pump. Your own drive in Upper Tysoe is where it stays.
When the motor has been run by now, stop safely and turn the vehicle off. Upper Tysoe lies under 10 miles from the M40; on it, take the first junction. Tell us about how far it went: a run towards Coventry, under 25 miles away, is a bigger job than a short hop across Upper Tysoe.
What takes place when our technicians get there in Upper Tysoe
We come to your car wherever it has stopped, whether that is outside Tysoe CofE Primary School, near Tysoe Marionette Theatre or on your own driveway. Both the work and the quote rest on three answers — what liquid, which quantity, and if it's run — so our engineers ask. On the phone call itself, you hear our quote — ahead of dispatch.
Your system is then cleaned thoroughly, after the tank is drained. With AdBlue that matters more than with petrol: it crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it doesn't wash out on its own. Filter cleaned or, if needed, swapped; clean diesel in; and then a test of the car. Before leaving, our engineers start it and check that it is running smoothly.
Most jobs are done in roughly half an hour after our engineers get there, as long as your motor hasn't run — and the pumps our engineers use are safe on a busy forecourt yet quiet at night outside a house. Paying happens on the day, not upfront, and you are given the documents an insurer asks for: an engineer report and a VAT invoice. Wrong-fuel cover is included in many insurance policies — so make use of the wait to check yours.
About Upper Tysoe and where it is
Upper Tysoe is a small village in Warwickshire, situated inland at an elevation of 119 metres, with semi-detached housing being the predominant type of accommodation. Upper Tysoe lies near the villages of Middle Tysoe and Lower Tysoe, as well as the historic estate of Compton Wynyates. Upper Tysoe is located approximately 22 miles from Coventry and 71 miles from London, making it a rural community with some access to larger urban areas. Upper Tysoe has a population of around 584 people, living in a quiet inland setting.
AdBlue drains around Upper Tysoe and across Warwickshire
As a rural village, Upper Tysoe has the same vans as surrounding places — Lower Tysoe, Compton Wynyates — all the way through CV postcodes and the surrounding area around them. Fastest of all: quote a CV35 0 postcode for the van.
The vehicle remains put. Anywhere it sits — near Tysoe Social Club, on a lay-by en route to Tysoe Walled Kitchen Garden, at home — that's where it gets cleared. Guessing doesn't help at the back of War Memorial, close to a border, or somewhere awkward to describe; phone and ask.
Upper Tysoe people: the short version
Tip nothing until you've read the cap. Still AdBlue in the diesel tank? Petrol in Diesel can drain it wherever it is, wherever across Warwickshire: switch it off and phone 0333 366 0103.