AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Westmill: Why It Occurs and How to Stop It
If AdBlue is already in your diesel tank, stop reading for a moment: leave your engine and the ignition off then ring 0333 366 0103. Around Westmill, catching it before the motor turns usually means draining and a thorough flush on the spot. Reading before the event? Then what follows covers how it happens and what to prevent it ever happening.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel motor need its own filler?
Many modern diesels on the roads around Westmill and Lower Green carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to the motor. Your exhaust, not the motor, is where AdBlue goes: sprayed into the gas to fresh it, from its own tank.
Separate tanks, separate fillers. Many of cars have a single flap for both, while others put the AdBlue filler to your boot or under the bonnet. At the pump, your diesel side is topped up all the time. The AdBlue side is topped up far less often, normally from a bottle, and normally by somebody who has to stop and think where it goes. Mistakes happen in that gap between the two.
Westmill: how AdBlue in your diesel tank happens
Rarely is it carelessness: usually three things line up.
Haste comes from the warning. The vehicle tells you as AdBlue runs low, and a dry tank sends the vehicle into limp mode — so the top-up gets done in a rush, before work on a drive off Burford Way, or heading home in the car park outside The Angel.
New-to-you motors are next, as well. Hire cars, new cars and company vehicles put their fillers in new places, and the hand reaches for the cap used on the old one.
A spouted bottle finds no resistance at a diesel filler no more than at an AdBlue one. So the pour, after begun, keeps on. Whether it occurs in Ickleford or the middle of Westmill, it's the same few seconds.
How to tell the AdBlue filler from the diesel one
Look at these before pouring, on a forecourt around Westmill or a drive out in Cadwell. Seconds, that's all.
- Where it sits misleads; the cap does not. AdBlue caps are often blue or carry the name "AdBlue" — diesel caps usually do not.
- Plenty of cars give AdBlue the smaller neck of the two.
- Open the filler flap and check for a label — many cars show which belongs in each filler just there.
- The handbook. If your filler isn't by your diesel cap, it is in the boot or under the bonnet, and the handbook says which.
- Ask the person who drove it last — before you leave, not when the light comes on — when you pick up a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park outside Hitchin.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach the diesel tank
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever across Hertfordshire that is.
- Turn off after you park — level ground, motor off, and never in a rush beside Swinburne Avenue at the roadside.
- Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew the cap, once finding the AdBlue filler and read it. Silly, yes, yet it does the trick.
- The diesel cap stays on. Where the two share a flap, confirm it's closed before the bottle comes up.
- Pour slowly, using the bottle's own spout. Stop when it is full or when the bottle is empty.
- Before you start the vehicle, shut the cap and check a second time that the diesel cap was never came off.
Stop there if you find, at stage two or three, that you have already poured into the diesel side. Never go on to stage five.
Westmill: already put AdBlue in the diesel tank?
Short order, then. Top of that: the motor remains unstarted. Do not switch the ignition on; on many diesels that alone runs the fuel pump. AdBlue doesn't mix with diesel — it sinks to the bottom of the tank, where the fuel is drawn from — so don't top up with diesel to dilute it.
At a forecourt — the nearest petrol station, Shell or another — the staff will normally help push your car clear, when you ask. Leave it where it is if you're on your own drive around Westmill.
Already started? Pull over when it's safe, then turn off. On the A1(M), under 5 miles from Westmill, that means the next junction. Mileage counts — a quick hop across Westmill is a smaller job than driving under 15 miles to St Albans — so say roughly how far it went.
Our arrival around Westmill, and what takes place next
Anywhere the vehicle came to rest, be it outside Oughton Primary and Nursery School, beside St Marks or on your own drive, our van travels to it. Which fluid went in, the amount, and whether it ran: our engineers ask since those answers set the work and price. On the call itself, you are told the price — before dispatch.
After that: draining, then a thorough flush of the entire system. More than with petrol, it matters here: the crystals build up, certain metals corrode, and none of that clears away on its own, no matter how long it sits. After your filter is flushed — or renewed, where required — fresh diesel goes in, and finally the vehicle gets tested. After that our engineers start the car and confirm it runs smoothly before we leave.
Most jobs are done in roughly half an hour once our technicians get there, as long as your engine has not run — and the pumps our technicians use are safe on a busy forecourt and quiet after dark outside a house. You pay on the day, with nothing upfront, and get a VAT invoice and an engineer report for your insurer. Before we get there, take a look at your insurance documents; plenty carry cover for misfuelling.
About Westmill itself
Westmill is a suburban area situated on the riverside in Hertfordshire, with an elevation of around 64 metres. Westmill lies approximately 32 miles north of London and 14 miles east of St Albans, near the villages of Ickleford and Snailswell. Westmill has a population of around 3624 people, predominantly living in semi-detached housing. Westmill is also close to the town of Hitchin, which provides local amenities and services.
AdBlue drains around Westmill, and Hertfordshire beyond
Throughout SG postcodes, the vans covering Westmill — a residential suburb — work the surrounding locations too, Snailswell and Hitchin among them. Fastest of all: quote a SG5 2 postcode to our van.
Shifting the vehicle is not necessary. A driveway, a lay-by on the way to Swinburne Park, a side street near Hitchin RFC: we drain it where it sits. Ring and ask rather than guessing if you're close to a boundary, or somewhere hard to explain, like the back of Hitchin Town Football Club.
For Westmill people, the short version
Always, the cap; after that, the tip. If AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank all the same, leave the vehicle off and call 0333 366 0103. Petrol in Diesel clears it where it waits, anywhere across Hertfordshire.