How Worried Should You Be? Petrol in a Diesel Car in Aylestone
If it has not been started, you can worry less than you probably are. "Have I ruined it?" is the first question everyone in Aylestone asks, and the honest answer is usually no, since petrol left in a diesel tank harms nothing till it is dragged through the fuel system — by ignition priming, by your starter, or by driving. Leave the motor off then call Petrol in Diesel — that is how you keep it that way. What petrol actually does to a diesel, how to judge how far it's gone, and how to keep it from happening again: that is the remainder of this page.
What petrol in a diesel does to your engine
On its way through an engine, diesel has two jobs. It lubricates to begin with, and only then does it burn. The high-pressure pump and the injectors are designed to extremely fine clearances, and your diesel passing through them is what keeps those surfaces from wearing against one another.
Badly at the first, not at all at the second: that's petrol. The clattering comes from petrol being made not to ignite when compressed, which is exactly the reverse of what a diesel needs. On top of that it is runnier than diesel, it strips out the protection the fuel system hinges on, and any pump running on such a blend is wearing itself.
Put those together and the shape of the problem is clear. Not contact but movement is what causes the damage. Any tank with petrol in it is a fuel problem. A pump that has been working on that petrol is the beginning of a mechanical one, and whatever a worn pump sheds travels on with your fuel to the fuel injectors downstream.
How bad is petrol in a diesel? Four situations we see in Aylestone
Filled up, never started. The best case there can be. The petrol is inside the tank and just that tank, and the job is a drain and a flush where the car stands. This is the one scenario that can only truly occur on a forecourt, since anywhere else your car has been driven to get there.
The ignition switched on, or a short start. Once primed, your system has drawn petrol out of that tank as far as the filter and the fuel lines. That is generally still a straightforward task — a drain, a flush, and your filter dealt with.
Driven a few miles. Now your pump has spent these miles labouring on weakened fuel. Tank, lines, filter, then fresh fuel put through the whole circuit: that is this work, and the way the vehicle was driven matters as much as the miles. On the school run to Montrose School, the distance is small. Getting as far as Leicester, under 3 miles away, makes a very different task — as does any miles on the M1, under 3 miles from Aylestone, with your engine labouring hard the whole time.
Driven until it complained. Clattering, a ragged idle, smoke, a throttle that has gone soft. The fuel isn't behaving like diesel any more, and your motor is telling you. Pull up wherever you are — the verge on Wigston Lane, a lay-by, a side street — and leave the vehicle where it is. A car stopped quickly very seldom has lasting damage, since the fuel drain and the flush, which still go first, sort it out.
Aylestone motorists and that petrol in a diesel stories they hear
It will not be fine. The myth: "Fill it the rest of the way with diesel and it will be." A fuller tank of the same mix is all it gives, because topping up removes nothing. Percentage isn't how a diesel fuel system copes with petrol, however much that guidance presumes.
"Modern diesels can handle a little petrol" — a myth, and closer to the opposite. More precise components and higher pressure are how a newer diesel runs its fuel, and that makes the lubrication count more, not less.
Myth: "If it starts and drives, there is no damage done." This is the one that fools people. A petrol motor fed diesel normally won't run, and so the motorist stops and the damage stops with them. Whilst the pump wears, a diesel fed petrol usually starts, idles and drives away as though nothing has happened. Being able to run is not proof of being fine.
Myth: "Add some two-stroke oil and drive the vehicle home." It's an old workaround for a separate fault. What petrol has diluted remains thinned, and the petrol stays inside that tank anyway.
"Drain it yourself and you're sorted" — a myth, because after it has been running some petrol sits in your filter and lines, ready to go right back through your pump at the next start. Draining petrol into a can at the roadside is also really dangerous.
How it happens: petrol in a diesel
Carelessness is seldom the cause, and nobody means to do it. The forecourt makes it easy: the petrol nozzle is the slimmer of the two, and it slips into a diesel filler with almost no resistance, while a diesel nozzle mostly will not go into a petrol car at all. So the mistake runs one way.
The moment habit stops matching the car is the moment it takes place. A new vehicle, a hire car or a courtesy car. Households running one of each, petrol and diesel. A well-known forecourt with the pumps in a different order. A hurried fill en route to South Wigston with a train to catch. Years of petrol motors behind you, a diesel Volkswagen Golf in front of you at the forecourt for its first tank — that is when. Throw in a back seat full of kids, a phone call or rain, and the hand wins.
How to avoid petrol in a diesel on your next fill-up in Aylestone
- The label is what counts, so check the pump rather than the colour: in the UK unleaded handles are normally green and diesel black, but not on every forecourt.
- The first fill in an unfamiliar car is the time to check your filler flap — inside it, or on the cap, many vehicles state which fuel they take.
- A coloured fob or a sticker on your diesel's key does more than any amount of meaning to remember, in a house with one of each.
- It seems daft and it does the trick: on your first fill in a new or hired car, say "diesel" aloud before you lift the nozzle off the pump.
- Tuck the phone away. This is an easy mistake to make whilst you are thinking about something else.
- Add-on devices are available for vehicles without one, and some diesels are built with a filler that won't take a petrol nozzle. Useful — but a backstop at best, never a reason to stop checking the label.
- Less petrol makes a weaker mix, and so stop the moment you notice — while remembering that the next stage is unchanged. It's still not to start the vehicle.
Put petrol in a diesel in Aylestone already?
Short and simple, then, is the order of things. Never start it, and do not turn your ignition on. Yet at the forecourt, at Asda or anywhere else? Ask the staff to help you roll the car away from the petrol pump. Ring 0333 366 0103 next, with three facts — your fuel, the approximate volume, and whether it has run.
AdBlue, not petrol? Then say so. Corrosion and deposits, not lost lubrication, make it a separate issue — Aylestone has a page all for it.
Aylestone petrol in a diesel jobs: why one costs more than another
An honest single price doesn't exist here: four scenarios, four separate tasks. Chiefly, your cost shifts with which one you're in. After that it is the ratio — how much petrol went in against how much your tank holds — and after that where the vehicle is and whether a van can reach it safely.
Before any quote, not after, we ask three questions: your fuel that went in, its quantity, and whether it has run. That's why. Their answers are what change a range into one firm number.
About Aylestone, briefly
Aylestone is a suburban area in Leicestershire, situated on the River Soar at an elevation of around 70 metres. Aylestone lies close to the city of Leicester, approximately 2.4 miles from the city centre, and is near other local areas such as Aylestone Park and Eyres Monsell. Aylestone has a population of around 6061 people and is characterised by semi-detached housing. Aylestone is located in the East Midlands region, about 87.2 miles north of London.
Fuel drain cover across Leicestershire, Aylestone included
Aylestone rests in the LE postcode area, and our teams that answer petrol in diesel call-outs there work the spots around it as well — Aylestone Park, Eyres Monsell and Glen Parva among them. A forecourt, a supermarket car park, a lay-by or your own drive are all locations our technicians work, and the car doesn't need to come to us.
Still at the pump in Aylestone?
Then you're in the best position there can be. Keep it off. Call.