How It Happens and How to Prevent It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Walmer Bridge
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave the engine and your ignition off and phone 0333 366 0103. Caught before the motor runs, it is normally a drain and a thorough flush, done where the car is around Walmer Bridge. If you're reading before it has happened, the rest of this page is about why it happens and how to make sure it does not.
AdBlue in a diesel car, and its separate tank
Many modern diesels around Much Hoole Moss Houses, like those in Walmer Bridge, run on two liquids; your engine takes just your diesel. Its own tank holds it, and from there it goes to the exhaust, and there spraying cleans the fumes.
Separate tanks, different fillers. Many of motors share a single flap for both, while some put the AdBlue filler to your boot or under the bonnet. The diesel side is fuelled at the pump all the time. Far less often, the AdBlue side gets topped up — normally from a bottle, by someone working out where it goes. That gap is where the error lives.
Walmer Bridge: how AdBlue in the diesel tank takes place
Rarely is it carelessness: usually three things coincide.
On a drive off Sea View before work, or in the car park at The Walmer Bridge heading home: that is where the hurried top-up happens. Why the rush? As AdBlue gets low your car tells you, and if it is empty, limp mode follows.
Then the car is unfamiliar. A hire car, a new car or a company car puts the fillers where your last one did not, and the hand gets to for the cap it would have used on the old one.
A spout-topped bottle finds no resistance at a diesel filler no more than at an AdBlue one. And so the pour, once begun, carries on. Whether it occurs in Little Hoole Moss Houses or the middle of Walmer Bridge, it is the same few seconds.
Which filler is for AdBlue, and which for diesel?
Before you tip anything, whether on a drive in Much Hoole Town or a forecourt in Walmer Bridge, check these. They take a couple of seconds.
- Position misleads; the cap does not. AdBlue ones are often blue or bear the name "AdBlue" — diesel caps normally don't.
- Check the size: the smaller filler neck is, on plenty of vehicles, the AdBlue one.
- A label inside your fuel flap often shows which fuel goes where, on plenty of motors. Look for it.
- The handbook. If the filler isn't by the diesel cap, it's in your boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- Check with the person who drove it last — before you leave, not when the light comes on — if you collect a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park at Croston.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach the diesel tank
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever in Lancashire that is.
- Park then switch off. Not on a slope, not with the motor running, and not in a rush on the side of Walmer Green.
- Daft as it sounds, speaking "AdBlue" aloud as you unscrew the cap does the trick — once you've found your filler and read the cap.
- The two behind a single flap? Then confirm the cap on the diesel filler is still shut ahead of raising the bottle.
- Tip slowly, using the bottle's own spout. Stop when it's full or when the bottle is empty.
- Only after that, start the car: close the cap, check a second time, and make sure your 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. Stage five is off limits.
Put AdBlue in the diesel tank in Walmer Bridge already?
Do not start your engine: that is where the short order of things begins. The fuel pump runs on plenty of diesels the moment your ignition is switched on — and so leave it off. Filling up with diesel won't thin it: instead, AdBlue drops to the bottom of the tank, right where fuel is taken from.
Ask the staff to help roll your car clear of the petrol pump if you're on a forecourt — the Suthers Star Garage, the Shell or anywhere else. Your own driveway around Walmer Bridge is the place it should stay.
Stop as soon as it is safe and switch off, if the motor has already run. The next junction means where to leave if you're on the M6, under 5 miles from Walmer Bridge. Tell us about how far it went: a run towards Preston, under 10 miles away, is a bigger job than a short hop across Walmer Bridge.
What happens when our technicians get there around Walmer Bridge
Wherever your car came to rest, whether by Little Hoole Primary School, beside Walmer Bridge Village Hall or at home, our van comes to it. What liquid went in, the amount, and if it ran: our technicians ask because those replies set both work and price. You hear that price on the phone, before anybody sets off.
Then the tank is emptied and the fuel system rinsed thoroughly. Unlike petrol, AdBlue forms crystals and attacks some fuel-system metals, and neither washes out by itself. That is why it counts more. Filter flushed or, if needed, swapped; clean diesel in; and then a check of your vehicle. Your engine is started next and tested to be sure it runs properly, all before our engineers go.
Unstarted vehicles mostly mean a half-hour visit after arrival. The equipment is fine on a busy filling station, and quiet enough for a driveway after dark. You pay on the day, with nothing upfront, and get a VAT invoice and an engineer report for your insurer. It's worth looking at your policy while we travel to you: misfuelling cover is included with plenty of policies.
About Walmer Bridge
Walmer Bridge is a village in Lancashire, situated on the riverside at a low elevation of around 15 metres, near the city of Preston. Walmer Bridge has a mix of housing types, but semi-detached homes are predominant, and the village is close to nearby places such as Little Hoole Moss Houses and Much Hoole. Walmer Bridge is located in the North West region of England, approximately 188.8 miles from London.
AdBlue drains across Lancashire, Walmer Bridge included
Walmer Bridge is a village, and the vans that cover it also work the towns around it, Much Hoole and Goose Green among them, across the PR postcode area. A postcode starting PR4 5 gets the van to you fastest.
No need to shift the vehicle. We drain it where it is — a side street close to Longton Womens Institute, a lay-by on the way to Longton Brickcroft Nature Reserve, a driveway. Tricky to pin down, like the back of St. Andrews? Close to a county line? Checking is better than guessing, and so phone.
The short version for Walmer Bridge motorists
Tip no AdBlue till you have read the cap. If AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank anyway, leave the car off then call 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel empties it where it sits, anywhere across Lancashire.