Woodside: How Does AdBlue End Up in a Diesel Tank, and How Do You Prevent It?
AdBlue already in your diesel tank? Then set this page down for now, leave your ignition and engine off, then call 0333 366 0103. A drain plus a thorough flush, carried out right where the car sits in Woodside, is usually all it takes when found before the engine runs. The rest of this page explains why it happens and how to make sure it does not — handy if you're reading ahead of time.
AdBlue in a diesel vehicle, and its separate tank
Many newer diesels in Queensway, as well as Woodside, carry on two liquids; the engine gets just your diesel. Kept in a tank of its own, AdBlue is sprayed into your exhaust gas and cleans it.
Each tank has its own filler. Under one flap, next to each other: that is the arrangement on a lot of cars. On others, AdBlue's filler sits beneath the bonnet or in your boot instead. Diesel gets filled at every filling station visit, week in, week out. Rarely filled, AdBlue usually goes in out of a bottle, poured by a driver who must stop and think which cap to use. That gap is where the mistake lives.
How does AdBlue in your diesel tank happen around Woodside?
Carelessness seldom explains it. Instead is three things lining up together.
On a drive off Carseggie Crescent before work, or in the car park at Otter's Head on the way home: that's where the rushed top-up happens. What is the reason for the rush? As AdBlue gets low your car warns you, and if it's empty, limp mode follows.
Next, your hand reaches for the cap it would have used on the old car — because a hire car, a new vehicle or a company car puts the fillers where your last one didn't.
A spout-topped bottle finds no obstacle at a diesel filler any more than at an AdBlue one. And so the tip, after begun, keeps on. Alburne Park or the middle of Woodside: it is the same few seconds in both.
Telling the AdBlue filler from the diesel filler
Before you tip anything, whether on a drive in Mount Frost or a forecourt around Woodside, check these. They take a few seconds.
- Blue and marking: an AdBlue cap is regularly blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap normally doesn't. Go by the cap, not its position.
- Plenty of motors give AdBlue the smaller filler of the two.
- The flap. Look inside your fuel flap for a label. Many motors say there which fuel goes where.
- Cannot see it next to your diesel filler? Then check below the bonnet or inside your boot — the owner's manual will say where.
- Ask the person who drove it last — before you leave, not when the light comes on — when you collect a hire or company car from somewhere like the car park at Markinch.
Keeping AdBlue out of the diesel tank when you top up
The day the light goes on, anywhere across Fife, use this routine.
- Not in a rush on the side of The Beeches, not on a slope, not with the motor running: park then switch off first.
- Find the AdBlue filler and read the cap. Say "AdBlue" out loud as you unscrew it. It sounds silly and it works.
- If both sit under one flap, check your diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle — then leave it on.
- Finish when your tank is topped up or the bottle is empty; until then, pour gently using the built-in spout.
- Only then, start the car: close the cap, check once more, and make sure the diesel cap was never opened.
If at stage two or three you find you have already poured into the diesel side, stop there. Never go on to step five.
Already put AdBlue in your diesel tank in Woodside?
Don't start the engine: that's how the short order of things begins. Keep your ignition off as well, because on many diesels switching it on alone runs the fuel pump. Don't top up with diesel to thin it: AdBlue does not mix with diesel, it sinks to the bottom of the tank, where the fuel is pulled from.
If you're at a forecourt, whether it is the BP or the Morrisons, ask the attendants to help roll the vehicle clear of the petrol pump. On your own drive around Woodside? So the vehicle remains put.
Stop as soon as it is safe and switch off, if the engine has already run. Woodside sits under 10 miles from the M90; on it, use the next exit. About how far did it go? Crossing Woodside is smaller a job than a run of under 15 miles towards Dunfermline, so tell us.
Our arrival around Woodside, and what happens next
Our van comes to the vehicle wherever it has come to rest — your own drive, beside Woodside Community Centre, or outside the local primary school. Our engineers ask what went in, roughly how much, and if it has run, since the replies determine this work and the price. No one heads out until you have had the quote over the phone.
Then your tank is drained and your system rinsed thoroughly. AdBlue crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it doesn't wash out on its own — which is why the flush counts more here than with petrol. Filter flushed or, if it must be, replaced; clean diesel in; and then a test of the vehicle. Next our technicians fire it up and confirm it runs properly before leaving.
Most jobs are finished in about half an hour after our technicians arrive, as long as the motor has not run — and the pumps our technicians use are safe on a busy forecourt yet quiet at night outside a house. Nothing upfront; you settle up that day. Afterwards, the VAT invoice and the report from the engineer are handed to you for your insurer. While we travel, have a look at your insurance documents; many carry cover for misfuelling.
About Woodside itself
Woodside is a suburban area situated on the riverside in Fife, with a mix of terraced housing and local amenities. Woodside has a population of around 3545 people and is located near other residential areas such as Alburne Park and Eastfield. Woodside sits at an elevation of 76 metres, overlooking the surrounding countryside. Woodside is approximately 14.7 miles from the city of Dunfermline, providing access to larger urban facilities.
AdBlue drains around Woodside and across Fife
Throughout KY postcodes, the teams covering Woodside — a residential suburb — work the surrounding locations too, Auchmuty and Eastfield included. A postcode starting KY7 5 gets our van to you fastest.
No need to shift the car. Our engineers drain it where it is — a side street close to The Lomond Centre, a lay-by on the way to Carleton Park, a driveway. Ring and ask instead of assuming if you are close to a border, or somewhere hard to explain, like the back of Plough.
The short version for Woodside motorists
Tip no AdBlue till you've read the cap. Petrol in Diesel drains it where it stands, anywhere across Fife, if AdBlue has gone in the diesel tank all the same — and so leave it off and call 0333 366 0103.