How Worried Should You Be? Petrol in a Diesel Car in Hales
Far less than you likely are, provided it hasn't been started. "Have I wrecked it?" is the first question everyone in Hales asks, and the truthful answer is normally no, since petrol left in a diesel tank hurts nothing till it is drawn through the system — by ignition priming, by your starter, or by driving. To leave the vehicle like that, phone Petrol in Diesel then leave the motor alone. Read on for three things: the effect petrol has inside a diesel motor, the signs of how far it has spread, and the way to make sure you don't repeat it.
The motor and petrol in a diesel: what goes on
Two tasks fall to diesel on its journey through a motor. It protects first, and after that does it burn. The high-pressure pump and the injectors are designed to very fine tolerances, and the diesel passing through them is what stops those surfaces from grinding against each other.
Of those two jobs, petrol manages the first badly 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 blend to wear itself. It is also made to resist igniting under compression — the reverse of what a diesel needs — which is why you hear the clattering.
Combined, those leave the shape of the problem clear. The harm is done by movement, not by contact. Petrol in the tank is a fuel problem. Once the pump has been working on that petrol, a mechanical fault has begun: whatever is shed by a pump that is grinding travels onward to the injectors with the fuel.
Hales, petrol in a diesel: four cases, from mild to serious
Fuelled but never started — the best it gets. At a forecourt, and really only there, that petrol is still confined to the tank — since everywhere else the car was driven to get to it. The job is emptying and purging on the spot.
A brief spell of running, or just your ignition on. With the system primed, your lines and filter now hold petrol that has come from that tank. Drain, flush, see to the filter: still usually straightforward.
Driven a few miles. Now the pump has spent these miles labouring on thinned fuel. The work is your tank, the lines, your filter and clean fuel through the whole system, and how hard the vehicle was driven counts as much as how far. Driving the kids to Loddon Junior School is one kind of trip. Very different again: a run to Norwich, under 15 miles away, or some mileage on the M11, over 50 miles from Hales, where the motor never stopped labouring hard.
It protested, and only then stopped: smoke, rattling, a throttle gone soft, an idle gone lumpy. The fuel is not behaving like diesel any more, and the engine is telling you. Pull up wherever you are — the verge on Preston Lane, a lay-by, a side street — then leave the vehicle where it is. Lasting damage is very unusual when a vehicle is pulled over quickly, and the fuel drain and flush-through that still go first sort it out.
Hales people and that petrol in a diesel stories they hear
"Top it up the rest of the way with diesel and it will be fine" — a myth. It won't. Topping up removes nothing; it gives you a fuller tank of the same mixture. Percentage isn't how a diesel fuel system copes with petrol, however much that guidance supposes.
If anything, the opposite holds. Myth: "A current diesel can cope with a bit of petrol." Protection counts more on modern diesels, not less, since their fuel passes through smaller parts at higher pressure.
One myth that catches motorists out: if it starts and drives, it must be unharmed. The motorist of a petrol motor fed diesel normally stops, because it will not run, and the damage stops with them. Nothing seems to have happened when a diesel fed petrol fires up, ticks over and drives away, as it usually does; meanwhile the pump wears. A running engine does not mean fine.
"A drop of two-stroke oil and drive it home" — a myth, taken from a fix from years ago, for a distinct problem. That petrol is still in your tank afterwards, and whatever it has diluted isn't put back.
The next start draws petrol back round the pump out of the lines and your filter, where some of it ends up once the engine has run. That is why a DIY tank drain does not leave you sorted — a myth. Also, a can of petrol drained by the roadside is truly hazardous.
Petrol in a diesel: how does it occur?
It's rarely carelessness, and no one does it on purpose. A diesel nozzle mostly will not fit a petrol car, but the smaller petrol nozzle goes into the filler of a diesel nearly without resistance — so forecourts make this one error easy, and just in that direction.
When habit and the vehicle stop matching, it occurs. Courtesy car, hire car, or a vehicle that's new. A household with one petrol and one diesel on the drive. A forecourt you know, only with its pumps laid out differently. Rushing for a train outside Reedham (Norfolk) and fuelling up en route. Precisely the moment it happens: after years of driving petrol, a driver fills a diesel Renault Megane for the first time. Add a back seat full of children, a phone call or rain, and habit takes over.
Hales drivers: how to prevent petrol in a diesel next time
- The label is what matters, so check the petrol pump instead of the colour: in the UK unleaded handles are normally green and diesel black, yet not on every forecourt.
- The first fill in a strange car is the time to check your filler flap — inside it, or on the cap, many motors state which fuel to use.
- A coloured fob or a sticker on your diesel's key achieves more than any amount of meaning to remember, in a home with one of each.
- "Diesel", aloud, before you pick up the nozzle — every time a new or hired car needs its first tank. It sounds daft. It works.
- Thinking about something else is when this becomes an easy mistake to make, so tuck your phone away then keep your mind on the pump.
- Up to a point, a misfuel inhibitor helps: some diesels come with a filler built to block a petrol nozzle, and add-on devices are available for the remainder. Treat it as a safety net, then keep checking the petrol pump.
- Less petrol makes a weaker blend, so stop the moment you notice — though remembering that the next stage is unchanged. It's still not to fire it up.
Already put petrol in a diesel in Hales?
The order of things is short, then. Starting it is out, and so is switching on the ignition. If you're still at the forecourt — Shell or anywhere else — ask the staff to help you push the car away from the petrol pump. Next, 0333 366 0103. We'll ask what got in, about how much, and if it's been run.
AdBlue, not petrol? Then say so. Corrosion and deposits, not lost protection, make it a different fault — Hales has a page all for it.
Why one petrol in a diesel job in Hales costs more than another
Four separate jobs sit behind the four situations above — which is why there is no fair single quote. Which of them you are in is mostly what shifts your cost. Where the vehicle is matters too, and whether a technician can safely reach it, after the proportion of petrol to what the tank holds.
Three questions come first, before quoting, instead of after — what got in, how much, has it run — and this is the reason. With the answers, there is a straight figure rather than a range.
About Hales itself
Hales is a small village in south Norfolk, situated near the market town of Loddon and the villages of Heckingham and Raveningham. Hales lies in a low-lying area of the Norfolk countryside, with an elevation of around 15 metres, and is approximately 11 miles from the city of Norwich. Hales has a population of around 525 people, predominantly living in detached houses.
Across Norfolk and around Hales: fuel drain cover
The vans answering petrol in diesel jobs around Hales, in the NR postcode area, also work the locations around it, Heckingham, Raveningham and Loddon included. You need not bring your vehicle to us. Forecourts, supermarket car parks, lay-bys and your own driveway are all spots we drain.
Hales: still at the pump?
Then, you couldn't be in a better position. Leave the vehicle turned off, then ring.