Preventing AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Wideopen: Why It Happens
Leave your motor and ignition off and ring 0333 366 0103 now — the rest can wait when AdBlue is already in the diesel tank. In Wideopen, finding it before your motor turns normally means draining and a full flush where it stands. If you're reading before it has happened, the remainder of this page is about why it occurs and how to make sure it doesn't.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel motor need its own filler?
Many newer diesels on the roads around Wideopen and North Brunton carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to the engine. AdBlue goes to your exhaust, where it is sprayed into the gas to clean it, and it lives in a tank of its own.
Each tank has its own filler. Plenty of cars have a single flap for the two, whereas others move the AdBlue filler to the boot or under the bonnet. Diesel goes in on every forecourt call-out, again and again. Far less regularly, the AdBlue side is topped up — mostly from a bottle, by someone thinking about where it goes. That gap is where the slip lives.
AdBlue in the diesel tank in Wideopen: how it happens
Carelessness seldom causes it. Instead is three things coming up at once.
The warning comes first. As AdBlue runs low the vehicle tells you, and if it runs out completely, the vehicle goes into limp mode. So the top-up is done in a hurry: on a driveway off Great North Road before work, or in the car park at Coach & Horses on the way home.
Then, the hand reaches for the cap it knew on the old motor — because a hire car, a new car or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't.
Lastly, the bottle goes in: a diesel filler or AdBlue filler, it slides in as readily, and once the pour begins, nothing stops it. Whether it happens in Brunswick Village or the middle of Wideopen, it is the same few seconds.
The AdBlue filler and your diesel filler: telling them apart
A few seconds is all these take — so check them before you tip anything, on a driveway in Dudley or a forecourt around Wideopen.
- Blue and marking: an AdBlue cap is often blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap normally does not. Trust the cap, not its position.
- The size. On many vehicles the AdBlue filler neck is the smaller of the two.
- Open the flap and check for a label — plenty of vehicles show which goes in each filler just there.
- The handbook says which it lives when your filler is not next to the diesel cap: your boot, or under the bonnet.
- Picking up a hire or company car, perhaps at the car park outside Cramlington? Ask the person who drove it last before leaving, rather than once the light comes on.
AdBlue top-ups that never reach your diesel tank
A routine for the day the light comes on, wherever in Tyne and Wear that is.
- Park then switch off. Not on a slope, not with the motor running, and not in a rush on the side of Warkworth Drive.
- Find the AdBlue filler, read the cap, and say the word "AdBlue" out loud while unscrewing it. It seems silly. It works.
- The two under one flap? Then confirm the cap on your diesel filler is still shut ahead of raising the bottle.
- Using the bottle's own spout, pour slowly — and stop when it's full or the bottle is empty.
- Close the cap and check again. Make sure the diesel cap was never opened. Only then start your car.
If at stage two or three you find you have already poured into the diesel side, stop there. Never go on to step five.
Wideopen: already put AdBlue in the diesel tank?
Then the order of things is short. Don't start the engine. Keep the ignition off as well, because on plenty of diesels it by itself runs your fuel pump. Thinning it with more diesel fails, since AdBlue sinks to the bottom rather than mixing — and that is where your fuel is sucked from.
If you're at a forecourt, whether it's the Wideopen Service Station or the Asda Express, ask the attendants to help roll your car away from the petrol pump. If you're on your own drive around Wideopen, leave the car where it stands.
When the engine has been run already, stop safely and turn the car off. On the A167(M), under 5 miles from Wideopen, that means the next exit. Mileage counts — a quick hop across Wideopen makes a smaller job than driving under 5 miles towards Newcastle upon Tyne — so say roughly how far it went.
Wideopen: what takes place when our engineers turn up
Wherever the car came to rest, whether outside Greenfields Community Primary School, near St. John's United Reformed Church or on your own drive, the van travels to it. The replies settle the work and the price, so we ask what went in, roughly how much, and whether it's run. That price comes over the phone, ahead of any van leaving.
Your system is then flushed thoroughly, once the tank is drained. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it does not wash out on its own — which is why the flush counts more here than with petrol. Your filter is cleaned, or replaced where it needs to be; fresh diesel goes in; and the car is tested. Then our engineers fire it up and make sure it runs correctly before leaving.
Unrun vehicles mostly mean a half-hour job from arrival. The kit is safe on a live filling station, and quiet enough for a residential street after dark. The insurer usually wants the engineer's report and the VAT invoice, and you get both once this job is done. Payment comes on the day, with no money upfront. It's worth looking at your policy while we travel to you: misfuelling cover is included with many policies.
About Wideopen and where it is
Wideopen is a village in Tyne and Wear, situated near the river in the North East of England, with an elevation of around 72 metres. Wideopen lies close to Newcastle upon Tyne, approximately 4.9 miles from the city centre, and is near other local places such as Brunswick Village and Hazlerigg. Wideopen has a population of around 2768 people, predominantly living in semi-detached housing.
AdBlue drains about Wideopen, and Tyne and Wear beyond
Throughout NE postcodes, our teams that cover Wideopen — a village — work the surrounding spots too, Seaton Burn and Hazlerigg among them. Our van gets to you fastest with a postcode starting NE13 6.
Moving the vehicle isn't necessary. The drain takes place right there, be it a drive, a street near John Harbottle Sports Pavilion, or a layby towards Lockey Park. Ring and ask rather than assuming if you are close to a boundary, or somewhere hard to explain, like the back of Wideopen Library.
In short, for Wideopen motorists
Before you tip, read the cap. Petrol in Diesel drains it on the spot, anywhere in Tyne and Wear, if AdBlue has gone in your diesel tank all the same — so leave the car off and ring 0333 366 0103.