Westborough: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Avoid It?
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave your motor and your ignition off and ring 0333 366 0103. Around Westborough, finding it before your motor turns normally leaves a drain and a thorough flush where it stands. The rest of this page explains why it happens and how to ensure it does not — handy if you are reading ahead of time.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel car need its own filler?
Diesel feeds your motor — but plenty of modern diesels seen round Westborough and Onslow Village carry a second liquid as well. Kept in a tank of its own, AdBlue is fed into the exhaust gas and cleans it.
Each tank has its own filler. Plenty of vehicles share a single flap for the two, whereas others move the AdBlue filler to the boot or under the bonnet. At the petrol pump, the diesel side gets filled all the time. Rarely topped up, AdBlue usually comes out of a bottle, tipped by someone who has to stop and think which filler to use. That gap is where the mistake lives.
Westborough: how AdBlue in your diesel tank happens
Carelessness seldom explains it. Instead is three things coming up at once.
First, the warning. Low AdBlue triggers a message from the car, and running dry means limp mode — so a rushed top-up, maybe before work off Eastway, perhaps at Wates House on the way home that evening.
Next, the hand reaches for the cap it would have used on the old car — since a rental car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers somewhere your last one didn't.
And the bottle fits. A bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one, so nothing stops the tip after it has started. Whether it takes place in Dennisville or the middle of Westborough, it's the same few seconds.
The AdBlue filler and the diesel filler: telling them apart
Check these first, at a forecourt in Westborough or a drive out in Guildford Park. Seconds, that's all.
- Position misleads; the cap doesn't. AdBlue caps are often blue or carry the name "AdBlue" — diesel ones normally don't.
- On plenty of cars, the size tells: AdBlue gets the smaller filler neck.
- A label inside the fuel flap often says which fuel goes where, on many cars. Look for it.
- The handbook. If the filler isn't by your diesel cap, it's in your boot or under the bonnet, 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 Guildford, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
Keeping AdBlue out of the diesel tank when you top up
When the light goes on, anywhere in Surrey, use this routine.
- Turn off once parked — flat ground, motor stopped, and never rushed by Midleton Road on the verge.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds daft and it works.
- The diesel cap remains on. When both share a flap, make sure it is shut before lifting the bottle.
- Using the bottle's own spout, pour slowly — and stop when it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Only after that, start the car: close the cap, check once more, and make sure your diesel cap was never opened.
Find at step two or three that it's already gone into your diesel side? Then stop right there. Skip step five entirely.
Already put AdBlue in the diesel tank around Westborough?
Short list, then. First: the engine stays off. Keep your ignition off too, since on many diesels it by itself starts the pump. Topping up with diesel won't weaken it: instead, AdBlue sinks to the base of that tank, just where fuel is taken from.
At a forecourt — Esso, Shell or another — the staff will normally help push the vehicle clear, if you ask. Your own driveway in Westborough is where it stays.
If your engine has already run, stop as soon as it is safe and switch off. On the M25, under 10 miles from Westborough, that means the next junction. Mileage counts — a short hop across Westborough is a smaller job than heading under 50 miles to Westminster — so tell us about how far it went.
Westborough: what happens when we turn up
Our engineers come to the vehicle wherever it has stopped, whether that is outside Queen Eleanor's Church of England School, close to Guildford Community Learning Centre or on your own driveway. Those replies decide this work and our quote, so our engineers ask what went in, roughly how much, and whether it's run. That quote comes on the call, before any van leaves.
Emptying that tank comes next, followed by a thorough flush of the system. 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. After the filter is cleaned — or renewed, where required — clean diesel goes in, and then the car is tested. The engine is started next and tested to be sure it runs properly, all before we go.
If your motor hasn't run, most jobs take about half an hour once we're there, using pumps that are fine on a busy forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house after dark. Nothing upfront; you settle up on the day. At the end, the VAT invoice and a report from the engineer are handed to you for your insurer. While we travel, have a look at your policy; plenty include cover for misfuelling.
About Westborough and where it is
Westborough is a suburban area in Surrey, situated inland at an elevation of 57 metres, approximately 27 miles from London. Westborough forms part of the larger urban landscape surrounding Westminster, with nearby areas including Dennisville, Park Barn, and Woodbridge Hill. Westborough has a population of around 7322 people, predominantly living in semi-detached housing. Westborough's location reflects the typical characteristics of suburban areas in the South East of England.
AdBlue drains round Westborough, and Surrey beyond
Being a residential suburb, Westborough shares its vans nearby places — Park Barn, Woodbridge Hill — right through GU postcodes and the wider area beyond. A postcode starting GU2 8 gets our van to you fastest.
Shifting the vehicle is not needed. A driveway, a lay-by on the way to Community Garden, a side street near Ivy Arts Centre: our technicians drain the car where it stands. If you're near a border, or somewhere hard to describe like the back of Surrey Stag, ring and ask rather than assuming.
In short, for Westborough drivers
Pour no AdBlue until you've read the cap. Still AdBlue in your diesel tank? Petrol in Diesel can empty it wherever it is, anywhere across Surrey: switch the vehicle off then ring 0333 366 0103.