Should You Worry? Petrol in a Diesel Car in New Wortley
Unstarted? Then less anxious than you probably feel. Everyone in New Wortley begins with "have I wrecked it?", and the honest answer is usually no: petrol resting inside your tank of any diesel stays harmless until priming, cranking or driving pulls it into your fuel system. Keep it that way: leave your engine off and ring Petrol in Diesel. The rest of this page explains what petrol actually does to a diesel, how to judge how far it has got, and how to make sure it does not happen to you a second time.
What petrol in a diesel does to the motor
Passing through a motor, diesel does two things at once. It protects to begin with, and after that does it burn. Extremely fine tolerances go into the injectors and the high-pressure fuel pump, and only the diesel flowing through keeps those surfaces from grinding together.
Petrol does the first job poorly and the second not at all. It's runnier than diesel and removes the lubrication the fuel system hinges on, and so a pump running on a petrol mix is a pump wearing itself. And petrol is designed to resist igniting under compression, which is the reverse of what a diesel needs from its fuel. That is where the clattering comes from.
Seen together, they make clear the shape the issue takes. The damage is done by circulation, not by contact. All a tank with petrol in it amounts to is a fuel issue. The start of a mechanical one is a pump that has been running on that petrol — and whatever a worn pump sheds moves on with the fuel to your injectors downstream.
How bad is petrol in a diesel? Four situations our technicians see in New Wortley
Filled up, and not started: nothing beats it. Being at a forecourt is what makes this possible: elsewhere, the car has been driven there to begin with. With the petrol held inside that tank alone, it's drained and flushed on the spot, and nothing more is needed.
A brief spell of running, or merely your ignition on. Petrol has left your tank and reached the filter and your lines, because your system has been primed. That is usually still an easy job — a drain, a flush, and your filter dealt with.
Driven a couple of miles. Now your pump has spent those miles labouring on weakened fuel. The work is that tank, your lines, the filter and fresh fuel through the entire system, and how hard the car was driven counts as much as how far. The school run to Castleton Primary School is one matter. Very different a second time: a trip to Leeds, under 3 miles away, or any mileage on the Inner Ring Road, under a mile from New Wortley, where the motor never stopped running hard.
Driven till it complained. Rattling, an uneven idle, smoke, a throttle that has gone soft. The motor is telling you the fuel is no longer behaving like diesel. Leave it wherever it stops: a lay-by, a side street, the verge on Driver Terrace. The drain and flush still come first, and they sort it out: if a car is pulled over early, permanent damage is very unusual.
New Wortley motorists and that petrol in a diesel myths they hear
Myth: topping up to full with diesel makes it fine. It doesn't. A bigger tank of the same mix is all it gives, because topping up removes nothing. Percentage isn't how a diesel fuel system copes with petrol, whatever that advice assumes.
"Modern diesels can handle a little petrol" — a myth, and nearer the reverse. Finer components and higher pressure are how a newer diesel runs its fuel, and that makes the protection matter more, not less.
"It starts, it drives, so there is no harm" — the myth that catches most people than any other. Diesel in a petrol motor usually means a motor that will not run: the motorist stops, and so does the damage. Whilst your pump wears, a diesel fed petrol usually starts, idles and drives away as if nothing has happened. Running doesn't mean fine.
"A drop of two-stroke oil and drive it home" — a myth, taken from a fix from years ago, for a different issue. The petrol is still in that tank after that, and what it has diluted is not put back.
"Drain it yourself and you're sorted" — a myth, since after it's been running some petrol lies in the filter and lines, waiting to go straight back through the pump on your next start. On top of that, petrol emptied into a can by the road is genuinely hazardous.
How does petrol in a diesel occur?
It is seldom carelessness, and nobody does it on purpose. One way only, since of the nozzles: the slimmer petrol one slides inside a diesel filler with almost no resistance, while the diesel one mostly will not fit a petrol vehicle. That is how the forecourt makes it straightforward.
Habit and the vehicle getting out of step is when it occurs. Hire cars, courtesy cars, and cars that are new to you. A household with one petrol and one diesel on the driveway. A familiar forecourt with the pumps in a different order. Filling up in a hurry on the way to Leeds, with a train to catch. Precisely the moment it takes place: after years of driving petrol, someone fills a diesel Volkswagen Passat for the first time. Add a back seat full of kids, a phone call or rain, and the hand takes over.
Next time you fill up in New Wortley: preventing petrol in a diesel
- Not every forecourt in the UK keeps to green for unleaded and black for diesel, though most usually do. Read the petrol pump's label; the colour is just a clue.
- The first fill in an unfamiliar motor is the time to check your filler flap — inside it, or on the cap, plenty of motors state which fuel they take.
- Good intentions do 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.
- It sounds daft and it works: on the first fill in a new or hired car, say "diesel" out loud before you take the nozzle off the petrol pump.
- Put the phone away. This is an easy mistake to make whilst you are thinking about something else.
- Up to a point, a misfuel inhibitor helps: some diesels come with a filler built to refuse a petrol nozzle, and add-on devices exist for the rest. Treat it as a backstop, then keep reading the pump.
- Less petrol makes a weaker mixture, so stop as soon as you realise — though remembering that the next step is unchanged. It's still not to fire it up.
Put petrol in a diesel in New Wortley already?
In that case, there is just a short order of things. Do not turn your ignition on, and do not fire it up. Ask the attendants to help you push it away from the petrol pump if you're still at the forecourt, whether that is Esso or somewhere else. Then call 0333 366 0103 and tell us what got in, about how much, and if it has run.
AdBlue, not petrol? Then tell us. Corrosion and deposits, not lost protection, make it a different fault — New Wortley has a page all for it.
One petrol in a diesel job around New Wortley costs more than another. Why?
Four different tasks sit behind the four scenarios above — which is why there is no fair single quote. Which of them you're in is chiefly what shifts your cost. The ratio counts next, meaning how much of your tank is petrol, and then the position of the vehicle and whether reaching it is safe for a van.
What got in, how much, and if it's run — three questions our engineers ask before costing, not after, for exactly that reason. Their replies are what change a range into one firm number.
About New Wortley
New Wortley is a suburban area in West Yorkshire, situated on the riverside near Leeds, with a mix of residential and industrial land use. New Wortley has a relatively low elevation of 41 metres and is located close to nearby places such as Holbeck and Armley. New Wortley is predominantly composed of flat housing, reflecting its urban character. New Wortley is also close to the city centre of Leeds, being only 1 mile away.
Fuel drain cover across West Yorkshire, New Wortley included
Holbeck, Islington and Armley are among the locations around New Wortley that the same vans work, answering petrol in diesel calls across New Wortley's LS postcode area. No need to bring your vehicle to us. Forecourts, supermarket car parks, lay-bys and your own driveway are all spots we drain.
In New Wortley and still at the pump?
The best spot there is, then — that's where you are. Keep it off. Phone.