Petrol in a Diesel Car in Pitcorthie: How Worried Should You Be?
Not started? Then less anxious than you likely feel. Till the ignition primes your pump, your starter cranks, or the car is driven, petrol in a diesel tank just rests there and does no harm. Which means the truthful reply to that first Pitcorthie query — "have I ruined it?" — usually no. Petrol in Diesel is who to phone, with the motor left off, and so it stays that way. Below, this page sets out what petrol really does inside a diesel, how far it might have got, and how to stop it happening to you a second time.
What petrol in a diesel does to the motor
Two jobs fall to diesel on its journey through a motor. It protects to begin with, and after that does it burn. The high-pressure pump and the fuel injectors are built to extremely fine clearances, and your diesel passing through them is what stops those surfaces from wearing down against one another.
Poorly at the first, not at all at the second: that is petrol. A pump working on a petrol mix is wearing itself out, because petrol is thinner than diesel and strips out the protection the fuel system relies on. Petrol is also designed to resist igniting under compression — the reverse of what a diesel needs from its fuel — and that's where the clattering starts.
Put those together and the shape of the trouble is plain. It is circulation that does the damage, not contact. Petrol in a tank is a fuel problem. Whatever a worn pump sheds travels on, borne by the fuel, into your injectors further along, which is why a pump that has worked on the petrol is where a mechanical fault starts.
Petrol in a diesel around Pitcorthie: how serious is it? Four situations
The best case there can be: filled up, not once started. Only your tank has petrol in it, so the job is emptying your tank and rinsing the system where the vehicle sits. This scenario can only truly occur at a forecourt: anywhere else, the vehicle got there by being driven.
The ignition switched on, or a short start. The system has been bled, and so petrol has left your tank and reached the filter and the fuel lines. Drain, flush, see to the filter: still usually easy.
Driven a couple of miles. Now your pump has spent those miles running on weakened fuel. The work is your tank, the lines, your filter and fresh fuel through the entire system, and how hard the vehicle was driven matters as much as how far. On the school run to the local primary school, the distance is small. Any miles on the A823(M), under a mile from Pitcorthie, means the motor working hard throughout, and a run to Dunfermline, under 3 miles away, makes a very different job too.
Driven on till it complained — rattling, smoke, a ragged idle, a soft throttle. The engine is telling you your fuel is no longer acting like diesel. Leave it where it has stopped: a lay-by, a quiet street, the verge on Masterton Road. The drain and flush still come first, and they deal with it: if a car is stopped soon, lasting damage is very rare.
Pitcorthie people and the petrol in a diesel stories they hear
Myth: topping up to full with diesel makes it fine. It does not. Nothing is removed when you top up — that tank simply carries more of the same mixture. That advice supposes a diesel fuel system handles petrol by percentage. It doesn't.
If anything, the opposite is true. Myth: "A modern diesel can cope with a bit of petrol." A current diesel runs its fuel through smaller components at higher pressure, which makes the lubrication count more, not less.
Myth: "If it starts and drives, there's no damage done." This is the one that catches people. Feed diesel to a petrol engine and it normally will not run, so the motorist stops — and the harm stops with them. Nothing looks to have happened when a diesel fed petrol fires up, ticks over and drives away, which it usually does; meanwhile the pump grinds. Running isn't the same as fine.
Not so: a two-stroke additive makes it safe to drive home. It was an old workaround, meant for another problem. What petrol has thinned stays thinned, and the petrol remains inside that tank regardless.
If the motor has run, part of the petrol is in the fuel filter and the fuel lines, not the tank — and the next start sends it straight back through the pump. So the myth "drain that tank yourself and you're sorted" doesn't hold. It is also really risky to drain petrol into a can by the roadside.
Why petrol in a diesel takes place at all
A careless moment is seldom the cause, and nobody means to do it. One way only, since of the nozzles: the narrower petrol one slides inside a diesel filler with almost no resistance, while the diesel one mostly won't fit a petrol vehicle. That is how the forecourt makes it straightforward.
When habit and your car stop matching, it happens. Any car that is new to you — hired, on loan as a courtesy car, or just bought. Households running one of each, petrol and diesel. The pumps in a different order on a familiar forecourt. A train to catch, and a hurried fill on the way to Rosyth. The first fill-up in a diesel Renault Megane after years of driving petrol is precisely the moment it takes place. Add a back seat full of children, a phone call or rain, and the hand wins.
How to prevent petrol in a diesel at your next fill-up around Pitcorthie
- Not every forecourt in the UK keeps to green for unleaded and black for diesel, even if most generally do. Check the petrol pump's label; the colour is only a clue.
- Inspect the filler flap. Plenty of cars state the fuel type inside the flap or on the cap. Look at it on the first fill in any car you don't know.
- Good intentions do less than a sticker or a fob in a bright colour on the diesel's key if a home has one of each. So label it.
- Say it before you lift it. On the first fill in a new or hired car, say "diesel" aloud before you lift the nozzle off the pump. It sounds silly and it works.
- Thinking about something else is when this becomes an easy mistake to make, and so put your phone away then keep your mind on the petrol pump.
- Add-on devices are available for motors without one, and some diesels are built with a filler that won't accept a petrol nozzle. Helpful — but a safety net at best, never a reason to stop checking the label.
- As soon as you realise, stop: less petrol in that tank means a weaker mixture. What to do next doesn't change, though — still don't start the car.
Put petrol in a diesel in Pitcorthie already?
Short and simple, then, is the order of things. Starting it is out, and so is switching on the ignition. If you're still at the forecourt — Tesco or anywhere else — ask the staff to help you roll the car away from the petrol pump. What went in, about how much, and if it has run: tell us that when you call 0333 366 0103.
If it was AdBlue instead of petrol, say so. That is a different problem — corrosion and deposits instead of lost lubrication — and it has its own page for Pitcorthie.
Why one petrol in a diesel job around Pitcorthie costs more than another
There's no honest single price for this, because the four situations above are four different tasks. Mostly, your cost moves with which one you're in. After that it's the ratio — how much petrol went in against how much the tank takes — and then where the car is and whether our van can reach it safely.
Three questions come first, before quoting, instead of after — what went in, how much, has it run — and that is the reason. The answers change a range into a straight figure.
About Pitcorthie and where it is
Pitcorthie is a suburban area located on the coastal fringe of Fife, with views out to the Firth of Forth. Pitcorthie sits at an elevation of 74 metres, close to the nearby city of Dunfermline and other local communities such as Duloch and Brucefield. Pitcorthie is characterized by its predominantly detached housing stock, reflecting its residential nature. Pitcorthie is situated near Garvock Hill, a local landmark in the area.
Across Fife and around Pitcorthie: fuel drain cover
Petrol in diesel call-outs around Pitcorthie — part of the KY postcode area — go to teams that also cover the spots about it, Duloch, Brucefield and Garvock Hill among them. You need not bring your vehicle to us. Forecourts, supermarket car parks, lay-bys and your own driveway are all spots where we work.
Still at the pump around Pitcorthie?
The best place there is, then — that is where you are. Phone, and leave it switched off.