Watcombe: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Prevent It?
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave your engine and the ignition off then call 0333 366 0103. Usually, when the motor hasn't run, it is emptied and fully purged where the car sits around Watcombe. Reading in advance? In that case what follows covers why it happens and what to stop it ever happening.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel car need its own filler?
Many newer diesels around Maidencombe, like those in Watcombe, carry on two liquids; your motor takes only your diesel. Kept in a tank of its own, AdBlue is fed into the exhaust gas and cleans it.
Each tank has its own filler. Under one flap, next to each other: that's the arrangement on many cars. On others, AdBlue's filler sits beneath the bonnet or in the boot instead. Filling the diesel side at the petrol pump goes on constantly. Seldom topped up, AdBlue normally comes out of a bottle, poured by someone who has to stop and think which filler to use. The mistake lives in that gap.
Watcombe: how AdBlue in the diesel tank occurs
It's rarely carelessness. Three things tend to line up.
Hurry comes from the warning. Your car tells you as AdBlue runs low, and an empty tank puts it into limp mode — so the top-up gets done quickly, before work on a drive off Moor Lane, or on the way home in the car park outside Crown and Sceptre.
The old car's filler is where the hand goes — yet a hire car, a new motor or a company car keeps the fillers elsewhere. That's the second thing: an unfamiliar car.
And the bottle fits. A bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one, and so nothing stops the tip once it has started. Combe Pafford or the middle of Watcombe: it is the same few seconds either way.
Telling the AdBlue filler from your diesel filler
Look at these first, at a forecourt in Watcombe or a driveway over in Higher Rocombe. Seconds, no more.
- The cap. The AdBlue cap is regularly blue, or marked "AdBlue". The diesel cap usually is not. Read it rather than going by where it sits.
- The size. On plenty of vehicles the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- A label inside the fuel flap often shows which fuel goes where, on plenty of vehicles. Check for it.
- In your boot or under the bonnet: that is where the filler sits if it is not by the diesel cap, and the handbook says which.
- The person who drove the car last. On a hire or company car picked up from somewhere like the car park at Torre, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
Keeping AdBlue out of your diesel tank when you top up
On the day the light appears — wherever you are in Devon — a routine to use.
- Park and switch off. Not on a slope, not with the engine running, and not in a rush on the side of Brunel Avenue.
- Silly as it sounds, speaking "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap does the trick — after you have located the filler and read the cap.
- Leave the diesel cap on. If both sit under one flap, check your diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle.
- Gently is best, through the bottle's own spout, until it is full or the bottle runs out.
- Only then, start the vehicle: close the cap, check a second time, and make sure your diesel cap was never opened.
Find at the second or third step that the bottle went into the wrong tank? That is where you stop. Skip stage five altogether.
Already put AdBlue in the diesel tank around Watcombe?
Short order, then. First: your motor stays unstarted. Do not switch the ignition on; on many diesels that alone runs the fuel pump. Thinning it with extra diesel won't work, because AdBlue sinks to the bottom rather than blending — and that's where your fuel is pulled from.
If you're at a forecourt, whether it is the the nearest petrol station or the Esso, ask the attendants to help push the car clear of the pump. Leave it where it is if you're on your own driveway in Watcombe.
Where the engine has run already, pull over somewhere safe and turn the vehicle off. On the M5, under 15 miles from Watcombe, that means the next junction. About how far did it go? Hopping across Watcombe is smaller work than a trip of under 25 miles to Exeter, and so tell us.
Our arrival around Watcombe, and what occurs next
Anywhere the vehicle has stopped, be it outside Watcombe Primary School, beside Brunel's Dance or at home, our van comes to it. We ask what went in, about how much, and if it has run, since the answers decide this work and our price. No one heads out before you've had the price by phone.
Next: a drain, then a thorough flush of the entire system. Unlike petrol, AdBlue leaves crystals and eats at some fuel-system metals, and neither washes out unaided. Hence it counts more. After the fuel filter has been cleaned — or renewed, where required — clean diesel goes in, and finally your vehicle gets tested. After that our technicians fire it up and check it runs smoothly before leaving.
If your motor has not run, most jobs take about half an hour once we are there, using pumps that are safe on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark. The insurer will ask for the engineer's report and your VAT invoice, and both are yours at the end. Payment is on the day, with no deposit. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it is worth checking yours while we are on the way.
About Watcombe
Watcombe is a suburban area located on the coast of Devon, sitting at an elevation of 88 metres and comprising predominantly semi-detached housing. Watcombe is situated near several nearby places, including Combe Pafford, Barton, and Higher Rocombe Barton, and is approximately 15.7 miles from the city of Exeter. Watcombe has a population of around 2993 residents and is part of the wider coastal community in the South West region. Watcombe's coastal setting provides scenic views and a unique environment for its residents.
AdBlue drains in Watcombe and across Devon
Watcombe is a residential suburb, and the teams that cover it also work the towns near it, Barton and Higher Rocombe Barton among them, across the TQ postcode area. Our van reaches you fastest with a postcode starting TQ2 8.
There's no need to move the car. Our technicians drain it where it is — a side street near Barton Baptist Church, a lay-by on the way to King George V Playing Field, a driveway. Tricky to explain, like the back of Acorn Centre? Close to a border? Asking beats assuming, and so phone.
The short version for Watcombe motorists
Read the cap before you pour. Petrol in Diesel drains it on the spot, anywhere around Devon, if AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank all the same — so leave it off then phone 0333 366 0103.