Darn Hill: Petrol in a Diesel Car? Here Is What Happens
Whatever you do, never switch your engine on, even for a moment, to move it. Pause; leave it off. Cleared and rinsed, just where it sits: that's normally all an unrun diesel with petrol in it takes. Whether it remains that straightforward depends on the minutes to come more than on everything else. Below is the order from this point, wherever around Darn Hill you happen to be.
Motor off: minute one with petrol in a diesel
In this sequence, and before anything else:
- The keys out of the ignition. Switching the ignition on can be all it takes to prime the fuel system, while priming pulls petrol out of your tank towards the parts it damages. Leave the car off altogether.
- Topping up with diesel seems like it thins the trouble. It does not: nothing gets out, and that tank simply carries more of the same.
- Close to passing traffic? Then the hazards go on before anything else, so the vehicle is easy to see.
- Off the petrol pump by hand. At a forecourt, get the attendants to help you roll it clear of the pump. Don't fire it up to shift it, however short the distance.
- Hold on to the receipt: the fuel and the rough amount are printed on it, and they are what we ask for first.
Still on the move when you noticed? Come off the M66 at the next junction if that is where you are, under 3 miles from Darn Hill, and pull over somewhere sensible and not pushing on to the services. Then begin at step one.
Every Darn Hill fuel drain starts here: has your motor run?
What happens after this rests on one answer, and just one.
If it has never been started:
- Nowhere but that tank: that is where the petrol yet is.
- Draining and flushing, on the spot, is usually the whole job.
- No spot is better, and it's why the first step matters so much.
Run at all, even for a second:
- Out of your tank, through the fuel filter, into the lines: that is how far the petrol has travelled.
- A bigger run carries it all the way to the high-pressure pump and your injectors.
- The job expands with the mileage — lines purged, filter sorted, occasionally more.
Diesel keeps the high-pressure fuel pump and the fuel injectors lubricated as it goes through them. Petrol gives them nothing, and that is why the line is drawn there. A tank of petrol, left still, hurts nothing. The components that move it are grinding the moment petrol is being pumped.
Darn Hill, petrol in a diesel: have these prepared before you call
Whether the van goes round or finds you comes down to a little planning.
- The best place to start is a postcode — one starting OL10 3 — for where you are.
- A road name is a help: Dumbarton Drive, say, or whatever street you've stopped in. A car park does the trick too.
- Or the nearest landmark. A car park is easier to find by what it serves, such as the one at Morrisons.
- Say what the car is — make, model — and check it's diesel.
- What got in. Petrol, or AdBlue. AdBlue is a separate job with its own page for Darn Hill, and so tell us which.
- Roughly how much — in litres from your receipt, or by how long the nozzle was in.
- Whether it's run. Then if it has, how far and how heavily.
- Hire or company car? Some agreements want the owner's go-ahead for this work, and sorting it before our engineers turn up is faster than afterwards.
Ring 0333 366 0103 next. Writing to works as well if it can wait, with the car parked at home, going nowhere.
While you wait for a fuel drain in Darn Hill
The wait is where well-intended help does the damage. Stick to these.
- Stay with the car if it's safe where it is — but if it has stopped somewhere dangerous, you come first: away from the traffic, waiting apart from it.
- Not to roll it a couple of yards, not to check it is all right, not for a passer-by's favour: nobody starts it.
- No additives. Two-stroke oil, injector cleaner, something from your boot — none of it takes the petrol back out.
- No home-made clearing. Siphoning petrol into a can by the roadside is hazardous, and it leaves your fuel that has already gone beyond that tank.
- Keep your ignition off — the windows and your radio too.
Van arrived? Your fuel drain, one stage at a time
- Our quote comes after three questions, not before them — what went in, how much, and whether it's run — because those replies shape the job.
- Draining it's how that mixture gets taken out of that tank.
- Your lines are flushed. If it ran, the petrol has moved beyond the tank, and the lines are holding it.
- Cleaned, or changed if the vehicle has a serviceable one: the fuel filter is dealt with next.
- The fuel system is primed on clean diesel.
- The start-up. With clean diesel in and your system bled, it is fired up and tested to be sure it runs smoothly.
We stay until it's running on fresh diesel. It's very unusual for a vehicle caught soon to be left with lasting damage, and normal driving starts again at once.
Darn Hill, after your fuel drain: back on the road
- Drive normally. There is nothing unusual to do after it's been started on fresh fuel.
- Pull over and call us back if anything seems wrong early on — a light on your dash, smoke from your exhaust, an idle that runs rough, or a throttle with a dead spot.
- An insurer, a fleet manager or a hire company may ask what was carried out, so keep your paperwork.
- The handle's colour isn't the thing to go by next time — the label on the pump is.
About Darn Hill
Darn Hill is a suburban area in Greater Manchester, situated near the River Irwell and close to the city of Manchester. Darn Hill sits at an elevation of 127 metres, with nearby neighbourhoods including Top of Heap, Heady Hill, and Summit. Darn Hill is characterized by its predominantly terraced housing stock, reflecting the area's historical development as a residential suburb of Manchester.
Fuel drains about Darn Hill and beyond
The same vans that take petrol in diesel jobs around Darn Hill cover Top of Heap, Heady Hill and Summit, and most of Greater Manchester beyond them. Ring and ask rather than assuming if you are somewhere hard to describe or near a boundary.
Petrol in a diesel around Greater Manchester? Leave it off then ring
Keys out, engine off, your receipt in your pocket: that's stage one done. The rest is for Petrol in Diesel, wherever the vehicle is — forecourt, kerbside or drive.