How Worried Should You Be? Petrol in a Diesel Car in Gordonsburgh
Likely less than you are now — provided no one has started it. Everyone in Gordonsburgh begins with "have I ruined it?", and the fair answer is usually no: petrol resting in your tank of a diesel remains harmless until priming, cranking or driving pulls it into your fuel system. Leave your motor off and phone Petrol in Diesel — that keeps it that way. Further down, this page sets out what petrol really does inside a diesel, how far it might have gone, and how to stop it happening to you a second time.
Petrol in a diesel: what does it do to your engine?
Passing through an engine, diesel does two things at the same time. It combusts, and before it ignites it lubricates. Extremely fine tolerances go into the injectors and your high-pressure pump, and just your diesel running through stops their surfaces grinding together.
Of those two tasks, petrol handles the first badly and the second never. The knocking comes from petrol being made not to ignite when compressed, which is exactly the opposite of what a diesel needs. On top of that it is runnier than diesel, it strips away the lubrication your system hinges on, and any pump running on that blend is wearing itself.
The shape of the trouble is plain when you put those together. The damage is done by movement, not by contact. Petrol in the tank is a fuel fault. The beginning of a mechanical problem is a pump that has been working on that petrol — and whatever a worn pump sheds moves on with the fuel to your injectors beyond it.
How bad is petrol in a diesel? Four scenarios we see in Gordonsburgh
Filled up, never started. The best case there can be. Just your tank has petrol in it, and so the job is emptying your tank and flushing the system where the vehicle stands. This scenario can only really happen at a forecourt: anywhere else, your car got there by being driven.
Started for a second, or only your ignition on. With your system primed, your lines and filter already hold petrol that came from your tank. That's usually still an easy job — a drain, a flush, and your filter dealt with.
Those few miles driven meant your pump labouring on fuel weakened by petrol the whole way. The work is the tank, the lines, your filter and clean fuel through the entire system, and how hard your car was driven counts as much as how far. Short trips, such as the school run to the local primary school, are one thing. Getting as far as Aberdeen, under 50 miles away, makes a very different task — as does any mileage on the M90, over 50 miles from Gordonsburgh, with your engine working hard the whole time.
Rattling, a ragged idle, smoke, a throttle gone soft: driven till it complained. What you are hearing is your engine reporting fuel that no longer runs like diesel. Pull up on the spot — on the verge on Ianstown Terrace, at the kerb, down a side road — and don't move it. Lasting damage is very unusual if a car is stopped early, and the fuel drain and flush-through that still go first take care of it.
What Gordonsburgh people get told about petrol in a diesel — and the myths in it
Myth: "Fill it the rest of the way with diesel and it'll be fine." It will not. Nothing comes out when you top up — your tank just carries more of the same blend. Percentage isn't how a diesel fuel system tolerates petrol, whatever that guidance assumes.
Myth: "A modern diesel can cope with a bit of petrol." If anything, the opposite. Finer parts and higher pressure are the way a newer diesel runs its fuel, and that makes the lubrication matter more, not less.
Myth: "If it starts and drives, there is no damage done." This is the one that catches people. Diesel in a petrol motor generally means a motor that will not run: the motorist stops, and so does the harm. A diesel fed petrol normally starts, ticks over and drives away as though nothing has happened, whilst the pump grinds. Running isn't the same as fine.
"A drop of two-stroke oil and drive it home" — a myth, borrowed from a fix from years ago, for a distinct problem. What petrol has thinned remains diluted, and that petrol stays inside that tank regardless.
The next start sends petrol back round the pump from your lines and the fuel filter, where some of that sits once the motor has run. That is why draining your tank yourself does not sort it — a myth. It is also really risky to drain petrol into a can by the kerbside.
How petrol ends up: petrol in a diesel
On purpose? Never. Through carelessness? Seldom, if ever. A diesel nozzle generally won't fit a petrol car, yet the narrower petrol nozzle goes into the filler of a diesel almost without resistance — so forecourts make this one error simple, and only in one direction.
The moment habit stops matching the vehicle is the moment it happens. Hire cars, courtesy cars, and motors that are new to you. Two cars on one drive, one petrol, one diesel. Your normal forecourt, its pumps suddenly in a different order. A rushed fill on the way to Keith with a train to catch. The first fill-up in a diesel Renault Megane after years of driving petrol is precisely the moment it occurs. Add rain, a phone call or a back seat full of children, and the hand does what it has always done.
How to avoid petrol in a diesel at your next fill-up in Gordonsburgh
- Not every forecourt in the UK keeps to green for unleaded and black for diesel, though most usually do. Read the pump's label; the colour is just a clue.
- The first fill in an unfamiliar motor is the time to check the filler flap — on it, or on the cap, plenty of motors state the fuel to use.
- Good intentions count for less than a sticker or a fob in a vivid colour on your diesel's key if a home has one of each. So label it.
- Say it before you lift it. On your first fill in a new or hired car, say "diesel" aloud before you lift the nozzle off the petrol pump. It seems daft and it works.
- Tuck the phone away. This is an easy mistake to make whilst you are thinking about something else.
- A misfuel inhibitor helps, up to a point. Some diesels come with a filler designed to reject a petrol nozzle, and add-on devices exist for vehicles without one. They are a backstop, not a reason to stop reading the pump.
- As soon as you realise, stop: less petrol in your tank makes a weaker blend. What to do next does not change, though — still do not start the car.
Put petrol in a diesel around Gordonsburgh already?
Then the order of things is short. Starting it is out, and so is turning on your ignition. Ask the attendants to help you roll it clear of the petrol pump if you're still on the forecourt, whether that's the nearest petrol station or anywhere else. Next, 0333 366 0103. We'll ask what got in, roughly how much, and if it's been run.
AdBlue, not petrol? Then say so. Corrosion and deposits, not lost lubrication, make it a separate fault — Gordonsburgh has a page just for it.
What makes one Gordonsburgh petrol in a diesel job cost more than the next
The four situations above are four separate jobs, so no single price for this would be honest. What shifts your cost is chiefly which of them you are in. Where the car is counts too, and whether a technician can safely get to it, after the ratio of petrol to what your tank takes.
Ahead of any quote, not after, we ask three questions: the fuel that got in, the volume, and if it's run. That is why. Their replies are what turn a range into one firm number.
About Gordonsburgh and where it is
Gordonsburgh is a small coastal locality in Moray, situated near the towns of Ianstown and Portessie, with semi-detached housing being the predominant type of accommodation. Gordonsburgh sits at a low elevation of around 3 metres, close to the sea and approximately 48 miles from Aberdeen. Gordonsburgh is one of several small communities in the area, including Rathven, that contribute to the local population of around 619 residents. Gordonsburgh is located in a scenic part of the Moray coast, with the city of Aberdeen being the nearest major urban centre.
Across Moray and in Gordonsburgh: fuel drain cover
Ianstown, Portessie and Rathven are among the places near Gordonsburgh that the same vans work, answering petrol in diesel call-outs across Gordonsburgh's AB postcode area. We drain where your vehicle is — your own drive, a lay-by, a supermarket car park, a forecourt — so it does not have to come to us.
In Gordonsburgh and still at the pump?
The best spot there is, then — that is where you are. Keep the car turned off, then ring.