Whickham Fell: AdBlue in the Diesel Tank? Leave It Off
AdBlue in your diesel tank? Then keep your motor off — and the ignition as well. Water with urea dissolved in it: that is AdBlue. Being water-based, it will not burn and won't blend with diesel; trouble only comes once the pump begins drawing it. Caught before your engine has been run, AdBlue in a diesel tank is normally a drain and a thorough flush, done where the vehicle is in Whickham Fell. Ring 0333 366 0103 before you do anything else.
Whickham Fell, AdBlue in the diesel tank: what to do at once
Do these:
- So no one can switch the ignition on, pull your keys away.
- Hazards on, if moving traffic is anywhere near.
- Which fluid, and roughly how much volume? Hang on to the bottle or your receipt, and our technicians will see.
- Call us from where you are. A postcode starting NE16 5, or the name of the nearest street, gets the van to you without a search.
Never:
- No starting the engine — not briefly, not to reposition the car.
- Plenty of diesels run their pump the moment the ignition comes on, so keep the car off.
- AdBlue does not dilute in diesel — it separates out — so adding extra diesel will not weaken it.
- Even a short stretch along Burnthouse Lane is too far to drive it.
- No draining it yourself, at all, on the verge.
Ask the attendants to help you move the vehicle off the pumps if you're on a forecourt around Whickham Fell, whether it's the Esso or somewhere else. Parked on your own driveway? Then it remains just as it is.
What AdBlue does in a diesel tank
AdBlue is made for the exhaust, not your motor. Its own reservoir keeps it, and from there it's sprayed into the exhaust, where it treats the gas. Nothing in it is meant to pass through a fuel pump, and nothing in a fuel pump is made to handle it.
It doesn't combine. Once it is poured into a tank of diesel, AdBlue acts not at all like diesel. It's heavier than diesel, and so it sinks and gathers at the bottom of your tank, which is where the pickup sucks fuel from. The first thing the fuel system pulls through, once it runs, is the AdBlue. So a vehicle that had AdBlue poured in on a drive in Marley Hill last night, and hasn't been started since, is still the simple case: the AdBlue is lying at the bottom of the tank, and nothing has drawn it in.
From there it does two kinds of damage. As its water goes, the urea left behind crystallises, and the crystals block filters and settle in fine passages. And it's corrosive to some of the metals a fuel system is made from, and so it keeps running on the components it gets to for as long as it stays there. Overnight, a vehicle sitting around Whickham Fell with AdBlue through its pipework grows worse; if it's only inside the tank, nothing changes. Water lubricates nothing. The high-pressure pump and each injector need diesel running through them, and so the water content harms them in its own right.
AdBlue in a diesel: why it is often worse than petrol
Top up a diesel with petrol by mistake at the BP, and the issue is thinned fuel. It mixes with your diesel, and whilst it is in your tank it does no harm; the damage comes from running your engine on it.
With AdBlue in a diesel, the liquid as such is plainly the wrong one. Not burning, it can't simply be run through. Nor can it be thinned, because it separates again — and the following fill will not clear away deposits or corrosion. So the flush matters more here, and trying your engine "to see", in the centre of Whickham Fell or out in Whickham, does more harm than almost any other mistake.
The good news is the same as with petrol. Emptying a tank is the easiest part on a fuel system, and without start-up, the AdBlue remains in it — anywhere in Tyne and Wear the car sits.
AdBlue in a diesel tank around Whickham Fell: how it ends up there
It's not deliberate. Plenty of cars have the AdBlue cap alongside the diesel one, occasionally under one flap, and mixing them up is simple after dark. It usually happens at home, from a container grabbed en route home, rather than at the filling station.
A couple of familiar ways account for the majority of them. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up happens in a hurry outside Clover Hill Community Primary School. A bottle is poured in at the end of the day on a drive just off Hole Lane. Else, after dark by Sunniside Social Club, the car gets topped up by a driver opening that flap the first time.
Rented cars, new cars, fleet motors, or the second car in a home with both fuels: the least familiar vehicles get it the most. Keep it switched off: that's the first response to an identical slip, anywhere in Whickham Fell or the remainder of Tyne and Wear you happen to be.
Already started the motor with AdBlue in the diesel tank around Whickham Fell?
Then the tank is no longer where the AdBlue is. It's been drawn through your filter and the fuel lines, and if your motor ran for any time, it has reached the high-pressure fuel pump and your injectors.
Expect rough running, exhaust smoke, falling power, lights on your dash, or a stall — coming back from Gelesfield Plantation, say, or midway across Whickham Fell. When safe, pull over then switch everything off — without restarting to see. Every start pulls more of it through.
On the Central Motorway East, under 5 miles from Whickham Fell, the first junction is where to exit, and anywhere sensible is where to park — not driving on.
How far it went matters. A couple of hundred yards across Whickham Fell to the car park by Cuthbert's Hill is a very different job from a run towards Newcastle upon Tyne, under 5 miles away, with the AdBlue reaching further into the fuel system with each mile. Let us know about how far it had come.
Wherever your car came to a stop is where all of it gets done, even with more to rinse out after the engine has been running. Very rarely does it leave long-term damage if it's noticed quickly.
Whickham Fell: how AdBlue is drained from a diesel
The car remains where it is, whether that is a street beside Sidegate Gallery, a drive, a lay-by or a forecourt in Whickham Fell, and the van travels to it. Before anything else our technicians ask what got in, roughly how much, and whether the engine has been run, since those answers decide the work.
The contaminated diesel and the urea leave together when your tank is emptied, on the spot. With AdBlue, more so than with petrol, flushing counts: the fuel system is flushed right through since residue will not flush out unaided. Fresh diesel goes in after your filter is cleaned — or swapped, if it needs to be — and then your car is tested. Most of these jobs are a half-hour visit once we get there, provided the motor has not run. Explosion-proof pumps make a live forecourt sensible to work on, and they're quiet enough to spare the street at night.
New diesel goes in to prime your system, and that is the last step. After that our engineers start it and you set off, whether from a parking space by Dunston or a drive in Whickham Fell. Our engineers make sure it runs smoothly on fresh diesel before we go. The entire job is done where the vehicle is, so it never has to go to a garage. You get a VAT invoice and an engineer report later on, which is what insurers ask for.
About Whickham Fell and where it is
Whickham Fell is a locality situated on the riverside in Tyne and Wear, with a mix of semi-detached housing and a population of around 781 residents. Whickham Fell sits at an elevation of 141 metres, close to the nearby places of Sunniside, Street Gate, and Fellside. Whickham Fell is located near Newcastle upon Tyne, which is approximately 4.4 miles away. Whickham Fell forms part of the wider residential area surrounding the city.
AdBlue drains across Tyne and Wear, Whickham Fell included
Throughout the NE postcode area, the vans answering AdBlue call-outs in Whickham Fell reach most of Tyne and Wear too, Sunniside, Street Gate and Fellside among them. Ring and check instead of guessing when you're by a border, or anywhere tricky to pin down.
No towing is needed. In Whickham Fell, a small village, a van that comes to you works: your vehicle is drained where it stands, whether on a driveway, a side street, a car park or a filling station.
What does AdBlue in a diesel tank cost to sort out in Whickham Fell?
Every job differs, and so not one single quote is honest. Whether your engine has been running, and for how long, comes first in what changes the cost. How much AdBlue got in comes next, and then the location of your car, since an open drive is simpler for a technician to get to safely than a tight gap behind Fellside Methodist.
That's why each call from Whickham Fell starts with the same three questions, asked before giving a figure, not after: what went in, how much, and whether it has run. Once those are known, a range turns into a single fixed figure.
Priced on the call before the engineer heads out, it is paid for that day — card or phone, no deposit. Plenty of insurance policies include misfuelling cover, so it is worth checking yours while we are on the way.
Next to the vehicle around Whickham Fell, still?
Then the most handy thing you can do is nothing to the vehicle. Keys out, motor off, ignition off. Petrol in Diesel handles the rest, in Whickham Fell or wherever within Tyne and Wear, after you ring 0333 366 0103 saying it's AdBlue, roughly what quantity, and whether the engine ran.