Westward Ho!: 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 motor and the ignition off then ring 0333 366 0103. Normally, when your motor hasn't turned, it's emptied and thoroughly flushed where the car sits around Westward Ho!. If you're reading before it has happened, the remainder of this page is about why it takes place and how to make sure it doesn't.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel car need its own filler?
Not one liquid but two: that is what plenty of newer diesels around Westward Ho! and Rickards Down run, with diesel for your engine. Kept in a tank of its own, AdBlue is sprayed into your exhaust stream to clean it.
Each tank has one filler of its own. On a lot of motors the two sit side by side under the same flap; on others the AdBlue filler is in the boot or under the bonnet. Filling your diesel side at the pump happens constantly. Rarely topped up, AdBlue usually comes out of a bottle, poured by a driver who has to stop and think what cap to use. Mistakes happen in that gap between them.
How does AdBlue in your diesel tank take place around Westward Ho!?
It's seldom carelessness. Three things tend to line up.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low the vehicle tells you, and if it runs out altogether, the vehicle drops into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a driveway off Nelson Road before work, or in the car park at Waterfront Inn on the way home.
Then your car is new. A hire car, a new car 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.
And the bottle fits. A bottle with a spout goes into a diesel filler as easily as an AdBlue one, so nothing stops the pour after it has started. The same few seconds settle it, in the middle of Westward Ho! or out in Buckleigh.
Telling the AdBlue filler from the diesel filler
Before you tip anything, whether on a driveway in Raleigh Estate or a forecourt around Westward Ho!, check these. They take a couple of seconds.
- The cap. The AdBlue cap is regularly blue, or marked "AdBlue". Your diesel cap usually is not. Read it rather than going by where it sits.
- The size. On many vehicles the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- A label inside your fuel flap frequently shows which fuel goes where, on plenty of vehicles. Look for it.
- In your boot or under the bonnet: that is where your filler sits if it is not by your diesel cap, and the handbook says which.
- Whoever had it before will know. Ask when you pick up a hire car or company car — at Barnstaple's car park, perhaps — not once the warning comes on.
How to top up without AdBlue in your diesel tank
Anywhere in Devon the light comes on, this is a routine for that day.
- Pull in on level, motor off, with time to spare — not hurried on the side of Golf Links Road.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds daft and it does the trick.
- If both sit under one flap, check the diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — then leave it on.
- Tip slowly, using the bottle's own spout. Stop when it's full or when the bottle is empty.
- Before you start the car, shut the cap and check a second time that your diesel cap was never came off.
Find during the second or third stage that AdBlue went in the wrong filler? That's where you stop. Leave out stage five altogether.
AdBlue in your diesel tank already, in Westward Ho!?
Then the order of things is short. Don't start your motor. On plenty of diesels your ignition alone runs the fuel pump, so do not switch it on. Do not top up with diesel to dilute it: AdBlue does not mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of the tank, where the fuel is sucked from.
The staff at Morrisons, Texaco or another forecourt will normally lend a hand to push the car clear when asked. Your own driveway in Westward Ho! is the place it stays.
When your engine has been run already, pull over safely and turn the vehicle off. The next junction is the place to come off when you are on the M5, under 50 miles from Westward Ho!. About how far did it go? Hopping across Westward Ho! is smaller a job than a run of under 50 miles towards Exeter, so say.
When we arrive around Westward Ho!, what takes place?
Our engineers come to the vehicle wherever it has stopped, whether that is outside St Margaret's Church of England Junior School, close to Westward Ho! Baptist Church or on your own driveway. We ask what got in, about how much, and if it has run, because the answers settle the work and the price. You get that quote by phone, before anyone sets off.
Emptying your tank comes next, followed by a thorough flush of your system. Not like petrol, AdBlue forms crystals and attacks some fuel-system metals, and none of that washes away by itself. Hence it counts more. Filter flushed or, if needed, swapped; clean diesel in; and then a test of your car. We don't go until it has been fired up and is running correctly.
Unstarted cars mostly mean a half-hour visit from the moment we arrive. The kit is fine on a live filling station, and quiet enough for a residential street after dark. Paying is on the day, not upfront, and you are given the paperwork your insurer asks for: an engineer's report and a VAT invoice. Wrong-fuel cover is included in many insurance policies — and so make use of the wait to look at yours.
About Westward Ho!, for a moment
Westward Ho! is a coastal village in north Devon, situated near the towns of Northam and Bideford. Westward Ho! has a population of around 1453 people and is characterised by detached housing. Westward Ho! is located near several nearby places, including Buckleigh and Silford, and is approximately 37.8 miles from the city of Exeter. Westward Ho! sits at an elevation of 18 metres above sea level, overlooking the coast.
AdBlue drains around Westward Ho!, and Devon beyond
Silford and Northam are among the places around Westward Ho!, a coastal village, that the same teams cover, over EX postcodes. Our van gets to you fastest with a postcode starting EX39 1.
The car does not need to move. A driveway, a lay-by on the way to The Green, a side street near Holy Trinity: our technicians drain it where it sits. Ring and ask instead of guessing if you're near a border, or somewhere hard to describe, like the back of Pebble Ridge Adventure Golf and Go Karts.
In short, for Westward Ho! motorists
Always, the cap; after that, the pour. Even so AdBlue in your diesel tank? Petrol in Diesel will drain it where it stands, wherever in Devon: switch it off and phone 0333 366 0103.