Don't Start It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Woodville Terrace
If AdBlue has got into the diesel tank, leave the engine off and keep your ignition off. Chemically, AdBlue is just urea in water. It does not burn, it does not mix with diesel, and the damage it does begins when the fuel system pulls it in. A drain and a thorough flush, done where the vehicle is around Woodville Terrace, is usually all AdBlue in a diesel tank needs — if it is caught before your engine has been run. First, phone us on 0333 366 0103.
Those opening minutes: AdBlue in the diesel tank around Woodville Terrace
Things to do:
- Take the keys out, and so nobody switches your ignition on.
- Put the hazard lights on if you are at all near moving traffic.
- So you can tell us which liquid it was and about what quantity, save your receipt or the empty bottle.
- The van locates you quickest with a postcode starting EH6 8, or just the name of a street nearby, and so call from the car.
Don't:
- Not even for a second, and not to shift the car: the engine stays off.
- Do not switch the ignition on. On many diesels that alone runs the fuel pump.
- AdBlue doesn't mix in diesel — it separates out — so adding more fuel will not weaken it.
- Leave it where it is instead of driving it anywhere, even a short distance up Woodville Terrace.
- By the road, don't attempt emptying it on your own.
Ask the people behind the counter to help you roll your car off the pumps if you're at a forecourt around Woodville Terrace, whether it is the JET or elsewhere. At your own driveway, do not touch it at all.
AdBlue in a diesel tank: what it does
Not the motor but your exhaust is where AdBlue belongs. It goes into its own tank and is sprayed into the exhaust gas to fresh it. Nothing in it is meant to pass through a fuel pump, and nothing in a fuel pump is made to handle it.
Tipped in with your diesel, it stays separate instead of blending — entirely different from fuel. Heavier than diesel, it sinks and pools below it — the very spot the pickup draws from. The first thing the system pulls through, after it runs, is the AdBlue. So a car that had AdBlue poured in on a drive in Seafield last night, and hasn't been started since, is still the straightforward case: the AdBlue is lying at the bottom of the tank, and nothing has drawn it in.
Two kinds of damage come from there. 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 working on the parts it reaches for as long as it remains there. By daybreak, a car sitting around Woodville Terrace with AdBlue through its pipework grows worse; if it's just in that tank, nothing changes. The water in it causes harm of its own: the high-pressure fuel pump and your injectors rely on diesel to lubricate them, and water gives them nothing.
AdBlue in a diesel: why it's regularly worse than petrol
A problem of thinned fuel is what you get from fuelling a diesel with petrol at the Shell. It mixes with the diesel, and while it's inside your tank it does no damage; the damage comes from running the engine on it.
AdBlue in a diesel is a different matter: not thin fuel, but no fuel at all. It can't just be run through, because it does not burn. Deposits and corrosion remain after the next tankful, and AdBlue separates again from the diesel, and so thinning it can't help. That is why the flush counts so much, and turning the key "to see" costs more with AdBlue than nearly any other mistake — in Abbeyhill or the centre of Woodville Terrace equally.
The same good news applies as with petrol. Never run? Then the AdBlue waits just in that tank, the simplest section of the whole system to clear, wherever the vehicle has come to rest across City of Edinburgh.
AdBlue in a diesel tank in Woodville Terrace: how it ends up there
It is not on purpose. Many cars have the AdBlue inlet alongside the diesel one, occasionally behind one flap, and muddling them up is simple after dark. Usually it's never the forecourt: someone picks up a container heading home and pours it in at home.
Usually, it occurs in one of a few familiar ways. A warning light comes on during the school run, and the top-up takes place in a hurry outside the local primary school. A driver pours the bottle in at home, just off Lochend Road, as the day ends. Or the car is topped up in the car park at Persevere, in poor light, by a person who has never opened that flap before.
The least familiar vehicles get it most — rentals, new cars, company ones, and the spare vehicle in a family with both fuel types. Wherever you are in Woodville Terrace or the remainder of City of Edinburgh, it is the same error and the same first answer: leave the car off.
AdBlue in the diesel tank in Woodville Terrace, and the motor started?
Then the AdBlue has left the tank. Given any running time, it goes on to the injection pump and every injector, having passed via the filter and pipework.
Perhaps returning from Leith Academy Sports Grounds, or part way across Woodville Terrace, the motor may go lumpy, smoke, drop power, flash your dash or stall. Pull over when safe. Turn off. Leave the car off rather than testing it again. Each start pulls more of that through.
If you were on the M8, under 10 miles from Woodville Terrace, come off at the next exit and stop somewhere sensible rather than pressing on.
Every mile pushes the AdBlue deeper in. That's why a hop across Woodville Terrace to park beside Leith St Andrew's and a drive of under 3 miles towards Edinburgh are very distinct jobs. Tell us roughly how far it had come.
There is more to flush once your engine has been run, and our technicians do all of it where your car has ended up. Permanent damage is very uncommon if it's noticed soon.
Clearing AdBlue in a diesel around Woodville Terrace: what it takes
A street by 3rd Company Boys' Brigade War Memorial, a drive, a layby or a forecourt: wherever your vehicle has come to rest in Woodville Terrace, our engineers come to it. Three replies shape the work, and so before anything else our engineers ask which fluid went in, about what quantity, plus if your motor has turned over.
The polluted diesel and the urea come out together when the tank is drained, right there. With AdBlue, far more than with petrol, the flush matters: the fuel system is cleaned right through since what remains won't wash away by itself. Clean diesel goes in after the fuel filter is flushed — or swapped, if it needs to be — and then the car is tested. If your motor hasn't run, most jobs take about half an hour once our technicians are there. Our pumping gear is explosion-proof, so a live forecourt is no issue, and it is hushed enough for a residential street after dark.
The last step is to bleed the system on clean diesel. At that point our engineers fire it up and you set off, whether from a parking space outside Edinburgh Waverley or a driveway around Woodville Terrace. It is checked on new diesel to make sure it runs properly before our technicians head off. Since the job is done in its entirety where your car is, a garage never comes into it. Insurers ask for a VAT invoice and an engineer report, and you get both afterwards.
About Woodville Terrace, for a moment
Woodville Terrace is a coastal locality in the City of Edinburgh, situated approximately 1.3 miles from Edinburgh city centre. Woodville Terrace sits at an elevation of around 25 metres, with views of the surrounding area. Woodville Terrace is predominantly composed of flat-type housing, which accommodates a population of around 7801 residents. Woodville Terrace is close to other localities such as Woodbine Terrace and Thornville Terrace.
AdBlue drains across City of Edinburgh, Woodville Terrace included
Woodbine Terrace, Thornville Terrace and Lochend are among the places around Woodville Terrace that the same vans reach, along with much of City of Edinburgh further out, over the EH postcode area. If you are close to a border, or somewhere hard to describe, ring and ask instead of guessing.
Wherever the car stands — a drive at home, a side street, a car park, a forecourt — we drain it on the spot, with no need to take it to us; which suits Woodville Terrace, a coastal area, well.
What does AdBlue in a diesel tank cost to sort out around Woodville Terrace?
Each job is different, so no fixed price would be fair. The price changes first with how long, if at all, the motor has been running, and next with the quantity of AdBlue that was put in. After that it depends on where the vehicle is and whether a van can get to it safely, which is simpler on an open drive than in a tight space behind Scot Regia Hall.
What went in, what quantity, plus if it ran: each Woodville Terrace enquiry begins by asking precisely that, before any quote, never after. The replies turn a range into a straight price.
The price is quoted on the call, before a van leaves; payment comes on the day, by card or over the phone, with nothing upfront. As our engineer is on the way, dig out your policy: many include misfuelling.
Still alongside your car in Woodville Terrace?
Not touching your car is, then, the best thing you can do. Keys out; engine and ignition off. Phone 0333 366 0103: AdBlue, the amount, and whether it ran is everything our engineers ask. Petrol in Diesel handles the remainder across City of Edinburgh, Woodville Terrace included.