Westhill: AdBlue in the Diesel Tank? Leave It Off
With AdBlue in the diesel tank, the ignition remains off and so does your motor. Chemically, AdBlue is just urea in water. Being water-based, it will not ignite and never combines with diesel; damage only comes when the pump begins pulling it. If your engine hasn't run yet, AdBlue in a diesel tank is normally drained and carefully flushed where the car stands around Westhill. No step comes before ringing 0333 366 0103.
Those opening minutes: AdBlue in your diesel tank in Westhill
To do:
- So no one can switch your ignition on, pull the keys away.
- Hazards on, if moving traffic is anywhere close.
- The empty bottle or the receipt tells us the product and the amount, so don't throw it out.
- Ring right where you are. Say a IV2 5 postcode or the nearest street name, and nobody has to hunt for you.
Never do these:
- No starting your motor — not briefly, not to shift the vehicle.
- Plenty of diesels power their fuel pump the moment the ignition goes on, and so keep it off.
- No more fuel added. The AdBlue won't mix, and so it is wasted.
- Even a short way along Leanach Gardens is too far to drive the vehicle.
- Emptying the tank yourself by the road is not worth trying.
Rolling your vehicle off the island is a job for attendants to help with, wherever Westhill forecourt you're on, the Tesco or any other. At home, the car remains just where it was left.
AdBlue in a diesel tank: what it does
The motor is not what AdBlue is made for; the exhaust is. It goes into its own tank and is sprayed into the exhaust gas to fresh it. Not one side fits the other: urea doesn't belong in an injection pump, and a pump can't deal with urea.
Poured in with the diesel, it stays apart rather than mixing — entirely unlike fuel. It's heavier than diesel, and so it sinks and collects at the bottom of that tank, which is where the pickup pulls fuel from. The first thing your fuel system pulls through, after it runs, is the AdBlue. So a vehicle that had AdBlue poured in on a drive in Smithton last night, and hasn't been started since, is still the simple case: the AdBlue is lying at the bottom of that tank, and nothing has pulled it in.
Once it's sucked in, the harm comes in two forms. It attacks some metals found in fuel components, attacking whatever it reaches till it is removed completely. And when the water goes, the urea forms crystals that clog filters and lodge in narrow passages. Where the AdBlue has reached the pipework, leaving it till morning around Westhill leaves things worse. Inside your tank alone, waiting costs nothing. Diesel lubricates the injection pump and every injector as it passes; water offers none of that, and that is a separate form of damage.
Why is AdBlue in a diesel frequently the bigger problem?
Fill a diesel with petrol in error at the Highland Fuels, and this issue is diluted fuel. It mixes with your diesel, and while it is inside the tank it causes no damage; the harm comes from running your engine on it.
The issue with AdBlue in a diesel is a completely wrong liquid. It does not burn, so it can't simply be run through. Crystals and corrosion stay after the next fill, and AdBlue separates again from the diesel, so watering it won't help. That is why the flush matters so much, and turning the key "to see" does more harm with AdBlue than nearly any other slip — in Inshes or the centre of Westhill alike.
The good news is the same as with petrol. Anywhere in Highland the vehicle has come to rest, an unstarted engine leaves the AdBlue still in the reservoir: the easiest part of any fuel system to empty.
How AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank around Westhill
In dim light, two caps together — the AdBlue cap and the diesel cap, now and then behind a single flap — can look the same. Nobody intends it; plenty of designs invite it. A bottle picked up while driving home and tipped in at home, rather than at the filling station, is the typical story.
The ways it happens are few and familiar. Rushing, outside the local primary school, after a warning light flashed on during the school run, a parent tops up your car. Close to Culloden Road, someone pours a container in on the drive after work. Another pattern: dim light, the car park by the pub in the village, and a driver using that flap for the first time.
The least familiar vehicles get it most — hire cars, new ones, company ones, and the spare car in a home with both fuel types. Same mistake, same first step — keep it switched off — wherever you happen to be around Westhill or the remainder of Highland.
Already started the motor with AdBlue in your diesel tank in Westhill?
Then the tank is no longer where the AdBlue is. Through your filter, along the lines, and — with any running — on to the injection pump and every injector: that is how far it has gone.
Maybe returning from Maxwell Park, or part way across Westhill, your engine might go rough, smoke, drop pace, light up your dash or cut out. Pull over when it is safe. Turn off. Leave the vehicle off rather than testing it again. Each start pulls more of that through.
Westhill sits over 50 miles from the M90; if you were on it, exit at the first junction and pull up somewhere safe rather than driving on.
How far it went counts. A couple of hundred yards across Westhill to the car park by Westhill Church is a very different job from a run towards Inverness, under 5 miles away, with the AdBlue reaching further into your system with each mile. Tell us roughly how far it had come.
Our technicians do all of the cleaning where your car has stopped, and once your engine has been started there is more of it. Very rarely does it leave long-term damage if it is spotted early.
Westhill: how AdBlue is drained from a diesel
We come to the vehicle, wherever it has stopped around Westhill: a side street near Smithton Church, a drive, a lay-by or a forecourt. The job depends on three answers, and we ask for before all else — what was put in, the quantity, and if the engine has run.
Next, emptying your tank on the spot removes the contaminated diesel along with the AdBlue together. Your system is flushed thoroughly, which matters more with AdBlue than with petrol, since what it leaves behind doesn't rinse out on its own. Clean diesel goes in once the filter is cleaned — or replaced, if it needs to be — and after that your car is tested. About half an hour once we arrive is usual for most jobs where your engine has not run. Our equipment is explosion-proof, and so a busy forecourt is no fault, and it's hushed enough for a residential street late at night.
Finally, the fuel system is bled with new diesel. You drive off as soon as our engineers have fired it up, and it makes no difference whether the car is on a driveway around Westhill or in a bay by Inverness. Before we leave, our engineers check it's running smoothly with clean diesel in. Our engineers do it all wherever the car has stopped, and it never needs to be taken to a garage. You receive a VAT invoice and an engineer report later on, which is what insurers want.
About Westhill itself
Westhill is a suburban area situated on the outskirts of Inverness, near the Moray Firth coast in the Scottish Highlands. Westhill sits at an elevation of around 120 metres, overlooking the surrounding countryside and the nearby city of Inverness. Westhill is characterised by its predominantly detached housing stock, reflecting its relatively recent development as a residential area. Westhill is located close to several nearby places, including Easter Muckovie and Woodside of Culloden.
AdBlue drains across Highland, Westhill included
The teams that answer AdBlue calls around Westhill also cover the places round it, Easter Muckovie, Woodside of Culloden and Resaurie among them, and most of Highland beyond, across the IV postcode area. If you are close to a boundary, or somewhere hard to explain, ring and ask rather than guessing.
Westhill is a residential suburb, and an on-site drain suits it: whether the vehicle is on a home drive, a residential street, a car park or a forecourt, we drain it where it stands, and so it never needs to be moved to us.
AdBlue in a diesel tank in Westhill: the cost of fixing it
There's no fair single quote, because the jobs are not the same. The price moves first with how long, if at all, the motor has been running, and next with the amount of AdBlue that was put in. After that it turns on where your car is and whether our van can reach it safely, which is simpler on an open driveway than in a tight spot behind Lord President's Stone.
Ahead of a figure, never after, each enquiry from Westhill begins with three questions: the fuel, the amount, plus whether it ran. Given those replies, a range narrows to a single fixed figure.
You get that price by phone, before anybody heads out, and you pay on the day, by card or over the phone, with nothing upfront. Misfuelling cover is part of many insurance policies, so it is worth looking at yours before the van gets there.
Still alongside the vehicle in Westhill?
Leaving your vehicle alone is, right now, the best thing you can do. Motor off, keys out, ignition off. Call 0333 366 0103 and tell us it's AdBlue, roughly how much, and whether it's run. Petrol in Diesel takes it from there, around Westhill or anywhere around Highland.