Walsoken: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Prevent It?
Stop reading for a moment when your diesel tank already has AdBlue in it: ignition off, engine off, and phone 0333 366 0103. Normally, when the engine has not turned, it is emptied and thoroughly cleaned where your car sits around Walsoken. Here in advance? In that case what follows explains how it comes about and how to prevent it ever happening.
AdBlue in a diesel motor: two tanks, two fillers
Diesel goes to your engine — but many current diesels seen around Walsoken and West Walton carry a second liquid as well. Your exhaust, not the engine, is where AdBlue goes: sprayed into the gas to clean it, from a separate tank.
Different tanks, different fillers. Under one flap, next to each other: that's the arrangement on many vehicles. On others, AdBlue's filler sits beneath the bonnet or in the boot instead. The diesel side is filled at the petrol pump all the time. Someone who has to stop and think where it goes normally tops up the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and far less often. It's in the gap that the mistake happens.
Walsoken: how AdBlue in your diesel tank takes place
Three things tend to come together, and carelessness is seldom one of them.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low the vehicle tells you, and if it runs out altogether, your vehicle goes into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a driveway off Church Road before work, or in the car park at The Black Bear on the way home.
Then your car is strange. A hire car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers where your last one did not, and your hand reaches for the cap it would have used on the old one.
Third, the spout fits: diesel filler or AdBlue filler, it goes in just as readily, and after the tip starts, no part halts it. The same few seconds settle it, in the middle of Walsoken or out in Paradise.
Telling the AdBlue filler from your diesel filler
Before you tip anything, whether on a driveway in Walton Highway or a forecourt around Walsoken, check these. They take a few seconds.
- Check the cap instead of going by where it sits: AdBlue ones are regularly blue or marked "AdBlue", and diesel ones usually aren't.
- On many vehicles, size tells: AdBlue has the smaller filler neck.
- A label inside the fuel flap frequently shows which fuel goes where, on many cars. Look for it.
- The handbook. If your filler isn't by the diesel cap, it is in the boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- Collecting a hire or company car, say at the car park outside Watlington? Ask whoever drove it last before leaving, not once the light goes on.
How to top up without AdBlue in your diesel tank
Wherever in Cambridgeshire the light comes on, this is a routine for the day.
- Not in a rush on the side of Sylvden Drive, not on a slope, not with your motor running: park then switch off properly.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, after finding the AdBlue filler and reading it. Daft, perhaps, yet it works.
- Both under a single flap? So confirm the cap on the diesel filler is still shut before raising the bottle.
- Using the bottle's own spout, pour slowly — and stop when it is full or the bottle is empty.
- Close the cap and check a second time. Make sure your diesel cap was never opened. Only then start your car.
Stop there if you find, at stage two or three, that you have already poured into your diesel side. Skip stage five altogether.
AdBlue in the diesel tank already, around Walsoken?
What follows is a short order of things, beginning with not starting your motor. The fuel pump starts on many diesels as soon as the ignition is switched on — so leave it off. Thinning it with more diesel fails, since AdBlue settles to the bottom rather than mixing — and that's where your fuel is pulled from.
If you're on a forecourt, whether it's the BP or the Shell, ask the attendants to help roll your car clear of the petrol pump. On your own drive around Walsoken? Then your car stays put.
Already started? Pull over when it's safe, then turn off. On the A1(M), under 25 miles from Walsoken, that means the next exit. Mileage matters — a quick hop across Walsoken is a smaller job than heading under 25 miles to Ely — so say about how far it went.
What happens when we arrive in Walsoken
Our technicians come to your car wherever it has stopped, whether that's outside St Peter's CofE Aided Junior School, close to All Saints or on your own driveway. What fluid got in, the quantity, and whether it ran: our technicians ask because the answers set both work and quote. No one heads out before you've had the quote over the phone.
Draining the tank comes next, then a full flush of your system. Unlike petrol, AdBlue forms crystals and eats at some fuel-system metals, and none of it clears away unaided. Hence it counts more. The filter cleaned or, if it must be, replaced; fresh diesel in; and then a check of the car. Next our technicians start it and check it runs correctly before we go.
Unrun cars mostly need a half-hour visit from the moment we arrive. The equipment is fine on a busy forecourt, and hushed enough for a residential street late at night. Nothing in advance; you settle up on the day. At the end, the VAT invoice and a report from the engineer go to you for your insurer. Misfuelling cover is part of plenty of insurance policies — so make use of the wait to look at yours.
About Walsoken and where it is
Walsoken is a suburban area in Cambridgeshire, situated near the town of Wisbech and approximately 19 miles from the city of Ely. Walsoken lies in a low-lying inland area, with an elevation of around 6 metres, and is characterized by predominantly detached housing. Walsoken is also close to other nearby places such as Paradise and Chequers Corner, and is located about 81 miles from London.
AdBlue drains round Walsoken, and Cambridgeshire beyond
As a residential suburb, Walsoken shares its vans nearby places — Wisbech, Chequers Corner — all the way through PE postcodes and the wider area around them. Quickest of all: give a PE13 3 postcode to our van.
Moving your car isn't necessary. Anywhere it stands — near war memorial, in a layby heading to Wisbech Town Football Club, on a drive — that's where it gets drained. Guessing doesn't help at the back of Walsoken Village Hall, on a boundary, or somewhere hard to describe; ring and check.
For Walsoken people, the short version
Before you tip, read the cap. AdBlue in the diesel tank after all? Leave it switched off and call 0333 366 0103; Petrol in Diesel drains it on the spot, across Cambridgeshire.