Should You Worry? Petrol in a Diesel Car in Orchard Brae
Provided it has not been started, you can worry less than you probably are. Till the ignition primes the pump, the starter turns, or your car is driven, petrol in a diesel tank simply sits there and does nothing. Which makes the truthful reply to the first Orchard Brae question — "have I wrecked it?" — normally no. Leave your engine off and phone Petrol in Diesel — that keeps it like that. Further down, this page sets out what petrol actually does inside a diesel, how far it may have got, and how to stop it happening to you again.
Petrol in a diesel: what does it do to the engine?
Diesel has two jobs on its way through a motor. Before it combusts, it protects — and then it combusts. Your high-pressure pump and your injectors are built to very fine gaps, and your diesel passing through them is what keeps those surfaces from wearing against each other.
The second task petrol does not do at all, and the first it does badly. Being less viscous than diesel, petrol strips away the lubrication a fuel system needs, so a pump on that mixture wearing itself. It's equally made to resist igniting under compression — the reverse of what a diesel needs — which is why you hear the rattling.
Combined, those leave the shape of the issue plain. Contact does not do the harm — circulation does. Where the petrol is only inside your tank, it's a problem of fuel, nothing more. Whatever a worn pump sheds goes on, borne by the fuel, into the injectors further along, which is why a pump that has worked on that petrol is where a mechanical problem begins.
Four scenarios our engineers see around Orchard Brae: how bad is petrol in a diesel?
Fuelled, and not started: no case is better. Being at a forecourt is what makes this the case: elsewhere, the car has been driven there to begin with. With that petrol kept in your tank alone, it's emptied and purged on the spot, and nothing more is needed.
Your ignition switched on, or a short start. With the system primed, the fuel lines and filter already contain petrol that has come from your tank. That's usually still a simple job — a drain, a flush, and your filter seen to.
Driven a couple of miles. Now the pump has spent those miles running on diluted fuel. How hard your car was driven counts as much as how far, and this work takes in your tank, the lines, the fuel filter and clean fuel through the whole circuit. Short trips, such as the school run to the local primary school, are one matter. Any distance on the M8, under 5 miles from Orchard Brae, means the motor has worked hard throughout, and a run to Edinburgh, under 3 miles away, makes a very different job too.
Driven till it complained. Knocking, an uneven idle, smoke, a throttle that has gone soft. What you are hearing is your motor reporting fuel that no longer behaves like diesel. Stop wherever you are — the verge on Craigleith Hill Crescent, a lay-by, a side street — then leave the car there. Permanent damage is very rare when a car is stopped soon, and the drain and flush that still go first take care of it.
Stories Orchard Brae motorists hear about petrol in a diesel
"Top it up the rest of the way with diesel and it will be fine" — a myth. It won't. Nothing comes out when you top up — your tank just carries more of the same mixture. Percentage isn't how a diesel fuel system copes with petrol, whatever that guidance presumes.
"Current diesels can handle a little petrol" — a myth, and nearer the reverse. At higher pressure, through more precise components: that's how a modern diesel moves its fuel, so the lubrication counts more, not less.
One myth that catches people off guard: if it starts and drives, it must be unharmed. Feed diesel to a petrol engine and it normally won't run, so the driver stops — and the harm stops with them. A diesel fed petrol normally starts, ticks over and drives away as if nothing has happened, while the pump wears. A running engine doesn't mean fine.
An outdated workaround for a separate issue lies behind this one. Myth: "Add some two-stroke oil and drive the vehicle home." The petrol is still in that tank after that, and what it has diluted is not put back.
"Drain it yourself and you are sorted" — a myth, because after it's been running some petrol sits in the filter and lines, ready to go straight back through your pump on your next start. And, a can of petrol filled by the roadside is genuinely hazardous.
How does petrol in a diesel happen?
A careless moment is seldom the cause, and nobody means to do it. One way only, because 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.
When routine and the vehicle stop matching, it occurs. A new car, a hire car or a courtesy car. Households running one of each, petrol and diesel. Your normal forecourt, its pumps now in a different order. A hurried fill en route to Haymarket with a train to catch. The first fill-up in a diesel Volkswagen Golf after years of driving petrol is precisely the moment it happens. Your hand does what it has always done when you add rain, a phone call or a back seat full of children.
Orchard Brae people: how to prevent petrol in a diesel next time
- Not every forecourt in the UK follows green for unleaded and black for diesel, even if most generally do. Check the pump's label; the colour is just a clue.
- In a motor you do not know, look inside the flap over the filler or at the cap before your first fill: plenty of vehicles state the fuel type there.
- Label the key. In a household with one of each, a coloured fob or a sticker on your diesel's key does more than any amount of meaning to remember.
- It seems silly and it does the trick: on the first fill in a new or hired car, say "diesel" out loud before you take the nozzle off the petrol pump.
- While you are thinking about something else, this is an easy mistake to make — so tuck your phone away.
- Up to a point, a misfuel inhibitor helps: some diesels have a filler designed to block a petrol nozzle, and add-on devices exist for the rest. Count it as a safety net, and keep reading the pump.
- The moment you realise, stop: less petrol inside the tank makes a thinner blend. What to do next doesn't change, though — still do not fire it up.
Already put petrol in a diesel in Orchard Brae?
Short and simple, then, is the order of things. Don't switch the ignition on, and do not crank it. If you are still on the forecourt — Esso or anywhere else — ask the staff to help you push the vehicle away from the pump. Then phone 0333 366 0103 and tell us what was put in, about how much, and whether it has run.
If it was AdBlue and not petrol, say so. That's a separate issue — corrosion and deposits and not lost protection — and it has its own page for Orchard Brae.
Why one petrol in a diesel task around Orchard Brae costs more than another
The four situations above are four separate tasks, so no single quote for this would be fair. What moves your cost is chiefly which of them you're in. Where the car is matters too, and whether a technician can safely get to it, after the proportion of petrol to what that tank holds.
That is why we ask three questions before pricing rather than after: what went in, how much, and if it has run. Their answers are what turn a range into one firm number.
About Orchard Brae
Orchard Brae is a suburban area in the City of Edinburgh, situated near the coast and approximately 1.7 miles from Edinburgh city centre. Orchard Brae is characterized by its predominantly flat-type housing and is close to nearby places such as Comely Bank, Craigleith, and Dean. Orchard Brae sits at an elevation of around 34 metres, with views of the surrounding area.
Fuel drain cover across City of Edinburgh, Orchard Brae included
Our vans answering petrol in diesel calls in Orchard Brae, in the EH postcode area, also work the locations around it, Comely Bank, Craigleith and Dean among them. We drain wherever your vehicle is — your own drive, a lay-by, a supermarket car park, a forecourt — so it never needs to come to us.
In Orchard Brae and still at the pump?
No position is better: that's where you now are. Call, and keep it switched off.