Wood End: AdBlue in the Diesel Tank? Leave It Off
If AdBlue has gone into the diesel tank, keep the motor off then leave your ignition off. AdBlue is urea mixed in water. Unlike fuel, it neither burns nor blends, and nothing starts till the engine sucks it through. A drain and a thorough flush, done where your car is around Wood End, is generally what AdBlue in a diesel tank takes — if it is caught before the engine has been run. Before you do anything else, ring 0333 366 0103.
Wood End, AdBlue in your diesel tank: what to do at once
Do:
- Remove the keys, and that prevents anyone switching the power on.
- Put the hazard lights on if you are anywhere near moving traffic.
- The empty bottle or your receipt shows us the fluid and the amount, so do not throw it away.
- The van finds you fastest with a postcode starting CV9 2, or simply the name of a street close by, and so call from the spot.
Do not do these:
- No starting the motor — not briefly, not to reposition your car.
- Plenty of diesels power their fuel pump the instant your ignition comes on, and so leave the vehicle off.
- No more fuel on top. The AdBlue will not blend, so it is wasted.
- Even a short stretch up Tamworth Road is too far to drive the car.
- Beside the road, don't try emptying it on your own.
Moving your vehicle away from the island is a job for attendants to help with, wherever Wood End forecourt you are on, the Esso included. On your own drive, don't move it at all.
What does AdBlue do in a diesel tank?
AdBlue is made for the exhaust, not the motor. Stored in a separate tank, it's squirted into the exhaust to clean the gases. Nothing in it is meant to pass through a fuel pump, and nothing in a fuel pump is designed to handle it.
Poured in with the diesel, it keeps separate instead of blending — quite different from fuel. It's heavier than diesel, and so it sinks and collects at the bottom of your tank, which is where the pickup pulls fuel from. Once your system runs, the AdBlue is top of the list to go through. Before then it sits underneath your diesel, which is why a vehicle topped up in Hurley Common yesterday and never switched on remains the simple one, as long as nobody touches your key.
It does two kinds of damage from there. As its water goes, the urea left behind crystallises, and the crystals block filters and settle in fine passages. And it is corrosive to some of the metals a fuel system is made from, and so it keeps labouring on the parts it gets to for as long as it stays there. By daybreak, a car parked in Wood End with AdBlue through its pipework grows worse; if it's just inside that tank, it doesn't. Diesel lubricates the injection pump and every injector as it passes; water offers no lubrication, which is a separate kind of harm.
Petrol or AdBlue in a diesel: why AdBlue is regularly worse
Petrol pumped into a diesel on another forecourt nearby's forecourt makes the fuel watery — that's the main fault. Damage only comes from running on it. Blended into your diesel and left in your tank, it does nothing.
AdBlue in a diesel is a different matter: not thin fuel, but no fuel at all. Not burning, it cannot just be run through. Nor can it be thinned, since it splits again — and the following fill won't clear away deposits or corrosion. So the flush counts for more with AdBlue, and turning your key "to see", in the heart of Wood End or out in Hockley, costs more than almost any other error.
With AdBlue, the good news is no separate from petrol. Wherever across Warwickshire your car has come to rest, an unstarted engine leaves the AdBlue still in the tank: the easiest part of a fuel system to clear.
How AdBlue ends up in a diesel tank around Wood End
Plenty of motors put the AdBlue filler beside the diesel cap, occasionally under a single flap, and after dark the two can look identical. No one means it. Mostly it occurs with a bottle bought on the way home and poured in on the driveway, not at the forecourt.
A couple of familiar ways account for most cases. Halfway through the morning drop-off, the dashboard warns, and outside Wood End Primary School the refill is rushed. Close to The Woodlands, a driver pours a container in at home in the evening. Or a driver unfamiliar with that flap tops up your car after dark, stopped in the car park outside Wood End Working Mens Club.
It comes up most in a hire car, a brand-new car, a company motor, or the other motor in a home with one of each fuel types — the cars people know least. Leave it switched off: that is the first step to an identical slip, wherever in Wood End or the remainder of Warwickshire you happen to be.
Started your engine with AdBlue in the diesel tank around Wood End?
In that case, the AdBlue is no longer inside that tank. It's been drawn through the filter and the lines, and if the engine ran for any time, it has reached the high-pressure pump and your injectors.
Lumpy running, smoke from the exhaust, dropping power, dashboard lights or cutting out: any might appear, perhaps midway across Wood End or coming back from The Dumble. Stop as soon as it is safe, switch off, and do not restart the vehicle to check. More of that is pulled through with each start.
If you were on the M42, under a mile from Wood End, come off at the next junction and stop somewhere safe instead of pressing on.
Distance counts: every mile carries the AdBlue further into your system, so driving towards Lichfield, under 15 miles away, gives a far larger job than hopping across Wood End to the car park by Wood End Village Hall. Let us know about how far it had come.
Our technicians do all of the flushing where the vehicle has come to a stop, and once your engine has been run there is more of it. Noticed early, it very rarely leaves lasting damage.
What emptying AdBlue from a diesel involves in Wood End
The vehicle remains where it is, whether that's a street near St Michael & All Angels Church, a driveway, a lay-by or a filling station around Wood End, and our van comes to it. The job depends on three replies, which we ask for before all else — what got in, the quantity, and whether your motor has run.
The polluted diesel and the urea leave together after that tank is emptied, on the spot. 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. Fresh diesel goes in once your filter is cleaned — or swapped, when it needs to be — and after that the car is tested. If your motor hasn't run, the majority of jobs take about half an hour once our engineers arrive. Quiet enough to use outside a house at night, and safe on a busy forecourt, the pumps are explosion-proof.
Last, the system is primed with fresh diesel. Starting the car comes next, and then you drive off from where the car is parked, outside Wilnecote or on a drive in Wood End. The test before our engineers leave is that it runs correctly on new diesel. Our technicians do it all wherever the vehicle has stopped, and it never has to be taken to a garage. Insurers want a VAT invoice and an engineer report, and both come afterwards.
About Wood End, for a moment
Wood End is a village in Warwickshire, situated on the riverside in the West Midlands region. Wood End has a population of around 1562 people and is characterized by semi-detached housing. Wood End sits at an elevation of 122 metres, near the villages of Freasley, Piccadilly, and Whateley, and is approximately 10 miles from Lichfield. Wood End is also within a reasonable distance from London, being around 98 miles away.
AdBlue drains across Warwickshire, Wood End included
The teams that answer AdBlue call-outs around Wood End also cover the locations around it, Freasley, Piccadilly and Whateley among them, and most of Warwickshire beyond, across the CV postcode area. Close to a border, or anywhere tricky to pin down? Checking beats guessing, and so ring.
Wood End is a village, and an on-site drain suits it: whether the car is on a home drive, a residential street, a car park or a forecourt, our engineers drain it where it stands, so it never needs to be moved to us.
Wood End: what AdBlue in a diesel tank costs to fix
Not one single price would be fair, because each job is different. Three things move the price: whether the motor has run and for how long, how much AdBlue got in, and where your car is. That last one turns on whether a technician can get to it safely, and an open drive is easier than a tight spot behind Miners Lamp.
Before a quote, not afterwards, each enquiry from Wood End begins with three checks: the liquid, the quantity, and if the engine ran. Those replies shrink a range right down to one number.
Priced on the call before the van sets out, the job is paid for that day — card or phone, no deposit. As our engineer is on the way, dig out your insurance: many cover misfuelling.
Wood End: still next to the car?
Then, the most helpful thing to do with your car is to not touch it. Motor off, keys out, ignition off. Petrol in Diesel handles the remainder, in Wood End or wherever in Warwickshire, once you phone 0333 366 0103 saying it was AdBlue, roughly what quantity, and whether the engine ran.