Should You Worry? Petrol in a Diesel Car in Long Newton
Far less than you probably are, provided it has not been started. Until the ignition primes the pump, the starter cranks, or your car is driven, petrol in a diesel tank just sits there and does nothing. Which means the honest reply to that first Long Newton question — "have I wrecked it?" — normally no. Leave the motor off then call Petrol in Diesel — that is how you keep it that way. Below, you will find what petrol actually does inside a diesel, how far it might have gone, and how to stop it happening to you a second time.
Inside the engine: what petrol in a diesel really does
Two jobs fall to diesel on its journey round a motor. Before it combusts, it protects — then it combusts. Very fine tolerances are built into your injectors and the high-pressure pump, and only your diesel running through keeps their surfaces from grinding together.
Of those two jobs, petrol handles the first poorly and the second never. It is runnier than diesel and removes the lubrication the system rests on, and so a pump running on a petrol blend is a pump wearing itself. And petrol is made to resist igniting under compression, which is the opposite of what a diesel needs from its fuel. That's where the rattling comes from.
The shape of the issue is clear once you put those together. It is movement that does the harm, not contact. A tank with petrol in it is a fuel issue. The start of a mechanical one is a pump that has been labouring on that petrol — and whatever a worn pump sheds moves on with your fuel to the fuel injectors downstream.
How serious is petrol in a diesel? Four scenarios our engineers see in Long Newton
The best case there can be: filled up, not once started. On a forecourt, and truly only there, the petrol is still limited to the tank — because everywhere else the vehicle was driven to reach it. The task is emptying and flushing on the spot.
Ignition on, or started for a second. Petrol has come out of that tank and reached your filter and the lines, since the system has been primed. Still generally easy: drain, flush, and your filter dealt with.
Some miles driven, and the pump has spent each of them running on thinned fuel. How hard your car was driven matters as much as how far, and this work takes in your tank, the fuel lines, the fuel filter and clean fuel through the whole system. A school run to St Mary's Church of England Primary School is one thing. Very different once more: a run to Durham, under 25 miles away, or any distance on the A1(M), under 10 miles from Long Newton, where your engine never stopped running hard.
It protested, and only then stopped: smoke, clattering, a throttle gone soft, an idle gone lumpy. What you are hearing is the engine signalling fuel that no longer acts like diesel. Whether it's the verge on Woodland Way, a lay-by or a side road, stop where you are then leave it. Long-term damage is very rare when a car is stopped quickly, and the drain and flush that still come first sort it out.
Stories Long Newton people hear about petrol in a diesel
False: topping up to full with diesel makes it fine. It doesn't. Nothing is removed when you top up — the tank just carries more of the same blend. A diesel fuel system does not accept petrol by percentage in the way that advice supposes.
Myth: "A current diesel can cope with a bit of petrol." If anything, the opposite. Protection matters more on current diesels, not less, because their fuel passes through more precise components at higher pressure.
"It starts, it drives, so no harm done" — the myth that trips up most people than any other. Diesel in a petrol motor normally leaves a motor that will not run: the driver stops, and so does the harm. Nothing seems to have happened when a diesel fed petrol fires up, ticks over and drives away, which it usually will; meanwhile the pump wears. Running doesn't mean fine.
An outdated fix for a distinct issue is behind this one. Myth: "Add some two-stroke oil and drive the vehicle home." That petrol is still inside your tank afterwards, and what it has thinned is not put back.
Myth: "Drain the tank yourself and you are sorted." Once your engine has run, some of the petrol is no longer in your tank: it is in your filter and the lines, and it goes right back through your pump at the next start. Also, a can of petrol filled at the roadside is genuinely dangerous.
How it happens: petrol in a diesel
On purpose? Never. Through carelessness? Seldom, if ever. One way only, since of the nozzles: the narrower petrol one slips inside a diesel filler with almost no resistance, while the diesel one generally won't fit a petrol motor. That's how the forecourt makes it straightforward.
It happens when habit and the car stop matching. Hire cars, courtesy cars, and motors that are new to you. One petrol and one diesel on the driveway of the same household. A familiar forecourt with the pumps in a different order. A train to catch, and a hurried fill en route to Teesside Airport. Years of petrol cars behind you, a diesel Renault Clio in front of you at the forecourt for its first tank — that's when. Your hand repeats what it has always done when you add rain, a phone call or a back seat full of kids.
Avoiding petrol in a diesel next time you fill up around Long Newton
- The label is what counts, and so check the pump instead of the colour: in the UK unleaded handles are normally green and diesel black, but not on every forecourt.
- In a car you do not know, look inside the flap over the filler or at the cap before the first fill: plenty of vehicles state the fuel there.
- Good intentions do less than a sticker or a fob in a bright colour on the diesel's key when a house has one of each. So mark it.
- "Diesel", aloud, before you lift the nozzle — each time a new or hired car needs its first tank. It seems daft. It does the trick.
- Tuck the phone away. This is an easy mistake to make whilst you are thinking about something else.
- Add-on devices exist for vehicles without one, and some diesels are built with a filler that will not take a petrol nozzle. Useful — but a backstop only, never a reason to stop checking the label.
- Noticing it halfway? Stop there and then. A weaker blend follows from less petrol in the tank, yet your next step stays the same: don't start the vehicle.
Petrol already in a diesel around Long Newton? Start here
The order of things is short, then. Never start it, and do not switch your ignition on. Still at the forecourt, at BP or anywhere else? Ask the attendants to help you roll it away from the pump. Next, 0333 366 0103. We will ask what was put in, about how much, and if it has been run.
Say so if it was AdBlue rather than petrol: it is a separate issue, with its own page for Long Newton, because AdBlue brings corrosion and deposits instead of lost protection.
One petrol in a diesel task in Long Newton costs more than another. Why?
Four separate tasks sit behind the four situations above — which is why there is no fair single price. Chiefly, your cost moves with which one you're in. Beyond that it is the share — how much petrol was put in against how much that tank takes — and after that where the vehicle is and whether a technician can reach it safely.
Three queries come first, before any quote, instead of after — what was put in, how much, has it run — and this is the reason. Given those answers, there is a straight figure rather than a range.
About Long Newton, for a moment
Long Newton is a village in County Durham, situated inland at an elevation of 46 metres, approximately 17.8 miles from the city of Durham. Long Newton has a population of around 810 people and is characterised by predominantly detached housing. Long Newton is close to nearby places such as Elton, Urlay Nook, and Whinny Hill, and is located in the North East region of England, about 216.3 miles from London.
Long Newton and Durham: where our fuel drain cover runs
Petrol in diesel jobs around Long Newton — part of the TS postcode area — go to teams that likewise cover the places around it, Elton, Urlay Nook and Whinny Hill among them. You need not move the vehicle to us. Forecourts, supermarket car parks, lay-bys and your own driveway are all spots we drain.
In Long Newton and still at the pump?
Then you're in the best position there can be. Leave the car turned off, and ring.