Should You Worry? Petrol in a Diesel Car in Bellevue
Far less than you probably are, provided it has not been started. Until your ignition primes your pump, your starter cranks, or the vehicle is driven, petrol in a diesel tank just sits there and does no harm. Which makes the honest reply to that first Bellevue query — "have I wrecked it?" — usually no. Leave your engine off and ring Petrol in Diesel — that keeps it like that. The remainder of this page explains what petrol really does to a diesel, how to tell how far it has got, and how to make sure it does not happen to you a second time.
The engine and petrol in a diesel: what goes on
Diesel does two jobs on its way through a motor. It ignites, and before it ignites it lubricates. The high-pressure fuel pump and the fuel injectors are made to extremely fine gaps, and the diesel passing through them is what stops those surfaces from wearing down against each other.
Petrol does the first task poorly and the second not at all. Being less viscous than diesel, petrol strips away the lubrication a fuel system needs, leaving a pump running on the mixture to wear itself. It is equally made to resist igniting under compression — the opposite of what a diesel needs — which is why you hear the clattering.
Seen together, they make clear what shape the issue has. It's movement that causes the harm, not contact. All a tank with petrol in it amounts to is a fuel fault. The start of a mechanical problem is a pump that has been running on that petrol — and whatever a worn pump sheds moves on with the fuel to the injectors beyond it.
Four situations our engineers see around Bellevue: how bad is petrol in a diesel?
Fuelled, and never started: nothing beats it. Being on a forecourt is what makes this the case: elsewhere, the car has been driven there to begin with. With that petrol kept inside that tank alone, it's cleared and cleaned on the spot, and nothing more is needed.
Your ignition switched on, or a short start. Petrol has left that tank and reached your filter and your lines, because your system has been primed. Drain, flush, see to the filter: still usually easy.
Those few miles on the road meant your pump running on fuel diluted by petrol throughout. Distance is only half of it; how hard it was driven matters just as much. Either way this work runs to that tank, your lines, your filter and clean fuel through the entire system. A school run to Banister Primary School is one matter. Very different a second time: a run to Southampton, under a mile away, or any distance on the M3, under 3 miles from Bellevue, where your engine never stopped labouring hard.
It protested, and only then stopped: smoke, knocking, a throttle gone soft, an idle gone ragged. The fuel isn't acting like diesel any more, and the motor is telling you. Stop where you are — on the verge on Asylum Road, at the kerb, down a side road — and do not move it again. A vehicle pulled over soon very seldom has long-term damage, because the fuel drain and the flush, which still come first, sort it out.
Stories Bellevue people hear about petrol in a diesel
Myth: "Fill it the rest of the way with diesel and it will be fine." It will not. A bigger tank of the same mixture is all you get, since topping up takes out nothing. The assumption behind that guidance — that diesel fuel systems accept petrol by percentage — is wrong.
Not so: a modern diesel copes with a bit of petrol. If anything, the opposite. Protection counts more on modern diesels, not less, because their fuel passes through more precise components at higher pressure.
This is the one that fools motorists. Myth: "If it starts and drives, there is no damage done." The motorist of a petrol motor fed diesel normally has no choice but to stop, because it will not run, and the harm stops there. Nothing looks to have happened when a diesel fed petrol fires up, ticks over and drives away, as it usually will; meanwhile your pump wears. A running engine doesn't mean fine.
Myth: a two-stroke additive makes it safe to drive home. It is an old workaround, supposed for another issue. It doesn't put back what petrol has weakened, and the petrol is still inside your tank later on.
The next start draws petrol back round your pump out of the fuel lines and the fuel filter, where some of it ends up after the motor has run. That's why draining your tank yourself doesn't sort it — a myth. On top of that, petrol drained into a can by the road is genuinely dangerous.
How petrol ends up: petrol in a diesel
Carelessness is seldom the cause, and nobody means to do it. One way only, because of the nozzles: the slimmer petrol one slides inside a diesel filler with almost no resistance, while the diesel one generally will not fit a petrol motor. That's how the forecourt makes it simple.
When routine and your car stop matching, it happens. Hire cars, courtesy cars, and vehicles that are new to you. A household with one petrol and one diesel on the driveway. The pumps in a different order on a well-known forecourt. Rushing for a train at Southampton Central and filling up en route. A new-to-you diesel Renault Megane, its first fuelling, and a motorist used to petrol: exactly when it happens. The hand repeats what it has always done when you add rain, a phone call or a back seat full of children.
Bellevue people: how to prevent petrol in a diesel next time
- Green for unleaded and black for diesel is normal in the UK — yet not on every forecourt. Go by the label on the pump, not the colour.
- Inspect your filler flap. Many motors state the fuel inside the flap or on the cap. Look at it on the first fill in a vehicle you don't know.
- One of each in the household? Mark your key to your diesel — a bright fob, a sticker — since meaning to remember isn't enough.
- Say it before you lift it. On the first fill in a new or hired car, say "diesel" out loud before you take the nozzle off the pump. It sounds daft and it works.
- While you're thinking about something else, this is an easy mistake to make — so tuck your phone away.
- A misfuel inhibitor helps, up to a point. Some diesels come with a filler designed to refuse a petrol nozzle, and add-on devices exist for motors without one. They are a backstop, not a reason to stop reading the petrol pump.
- As soon as you realise, stop: less petrol inside the tank means a thinner blend. What to do next does not change, though — still don't fire it up.
Already put petrol in a diesel around Bellevue?
Short and simple, then, is the order of things. Do not switch the ignition on, and do not fire it up. Ask the staff to help you push it away from the pump if you are still on the forecourt, whether that's Esso or somewhere else. Next, 0333 366 0103. We will ask what went in, about how much, and if it's been run.
If it was AdBlue rather than petrol, say so. That's a separate problem — corrosion and deposits instead of lost lubrication — and it has its own page for Bellevue.
Why one petrol in a diesel job around Bellevue costs more than another
The four situations above are four separate tasks, so no single quote for this would be fair. Chiefly, the cost shifts with which situation you're in. Where the car is matters too, and whether a technician can safely get to it, after the ratio of petrol to what that tank holds.
Ahead of any quote, not after, come three queries: the fuel that got in, its amount, and if it's run. That is why. The answers change a range into a straight figure.
About Bellevue
Bellevue is a suburban area located on the coast of Hampshire, near the city of Southampton. Bellevue sits at an elevation of 22 metres, with its predominant housing consisting of flats. Bellevue is close to nearby places such as Bedford Place, Newtown, and Banisters Park, and is situated approximately 68.8 miles from London.
Bellevue and Hampshire: where our fuel drain cover reaches
The teams answering petrol in diesel call-outs in Bellevue, in the SO postcode area, also work the locations near it, Bedford Place, Newtown and Banisters Park among them. No need to bring your vehicle to us. Forecourts, supermarket car parks, lay-bys and your own driveway are all places where we work.
In Bellevue and still at the pump?
Then, you could not be in a better spot. Turned off it stays; then phone.