Rock End: Petrol in a Diesel Car? How Worried to Be
Less than you probably are, if it has not been started. "Have I ruined it?" is the first question everyone around Rock End asks, and the honest answer is generally no, because petrol resting in a diesel tank harms nothing till it is drawn through your fuel system — by ignition priming, by your starter, or by driving. Keep it that way: leave the motor off then phone Petrol in Diesel. The rest of this page sets out 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 again.
What petrol in a diesel does to your engine
On its way through a motor, diesel has two jobs. Before it combusts, it lubricates — then it ignites. The high-pressure fuel pump and your injectors are built to extremely fine gaps, and the diesel passing through them is what keeps those surfaces from grinding against each other.
Poorly at the first, not at all at the second: that is petrol. The rattling comes from petrol being made not to ignite when compressed, which is exactly the opposite of what a diesel needs. On top of that it is runnier than diesel, it strips away the lubrication the fuel system depends on, and any pump running on that blend is wearing itself.
Put those together and the shape of the trouble is clear. The harm is done by circulation, not by contact. Any tank with petrol in it is a fuel problem. A pump that has been running on that petrol is the start of a mechanical one, and whatever a worn pump sheds moves on with the fuel to the injectors downstream.
How bad is petrol in a diesel? Four situations our technicians see in Rock End
Fuelled, and not started: nothing beats it. Just your tank has petrol in it, and so the job is clearing the tank and cleaning the fuel system where the car sits. This scenario can only truly happen on a forecourt: anywhere else, the vehicle got there by being driven.
Your ignition turned on, or a short start. Once primed, the fuel system has drawn petrol from your tank as far as the fuel filter and your lines. Drain, flush, see to the filter: still usually easy.
A couple of miles driven, and your pump has spent every one of them working on thinned fuel. Tank, lines, filter, then clean fuel put through the whole system: that's the work, and the way the vehicle was driven matters as much as the distance. The school run to Squirrel Hayes First School is one matter. Getting as far as Stoke-on-Trent, under 10 miles away, makes a very different job — as does any distance on the M6, under 10 miles from Rock End, with the motor working hard all the way.
It protested, and only then stopped: smoke, knocking, a throttle gone soft, an idle gone ragged. What you are hearing is your engine reporting fuel that no longer runs like diesel. Whether it's the verge on Holywell Close, a lay-by or a side road, stop where you are and leave it. A car pulled over soon very rarely has lasting damage, as the drain and the flush-through, which still go first, deal with it.
What Rock End people get told about petrol in a diesel — and the stories in it
False: topping up to full with diesel makes it fine. It does not. A bigger tank of the same mixture is all you get, since topping up takes out nothing. Percentage isn't how a diesel fuel system copes with petrol, whatever that guidance supposes.
Not so: a newer diesel copes with a bit of petrol. Rather, the reverse. Protection matters more on current diesels, not less, because their fuel passes through smaller parts at higher pressure.
Myth: "If it starts and drives, there is no harm done." This is the one that fools drivers. The driver of a petrol engine fed diesel usually has no choice but to stop, because it will not run, and the damage stops there. 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. Being able to run is not proof of being fine.
"A drop of two-stroke oil and drive it home" — a myth, borrowed from a fix from years ago, for a separate fault. None of what petrol weakened is put back by it — and afterwards, the tank still holds the petrol.
If the engine has run, part of the petrol sits in your filter and the fuel lines, not the tank — and your next start pulls it right back through the pump. So the myth "drain that tank yourself and you are sorted" doesn't hold. On top of that, petrol drained into a can by the road is truly risky.
Petrol in a diesel: how does it occur?
A careless moment is rarely the cause, and no one means to do it. The petrol nozzle is the slimmer of the two and slips into a diesel filler with almost no resistance; a diesel nozzle mostly won't go into a petrol motor at all. The forecourt makes it simple, and the slip runs one way.
Routine and your car getting out of step is when it takes place. A new motor, a hire car or a courtesy car. A household with one petrol and one diesel on the driveway. A well-known forecourt with the pumps in a different order. A train to catch, and a hurried fill on the way to Kidsgrove. A new-to-you diesel Renault Clio, its first fuelling, and a motorist used to petrol: exactly when it occurs. Throw in a back seat full of children, a phone call or rain, and habit takes over.
Avoiding petrol in a diesel next time you fill up in Rock End
- Read the pump, not the colour. In the UK unleaded handles are usually green and diesel black, yet not on each forecourt. The label is what counts.
- Many cars state the fuel inside the filler flap or on the cap, so check there on the first fill in any vehicle you don't know.
- Mark your key. In a house with one of each, a coloured fob or a sticker on the diesel's key does more than any amount of intending to remember.
- Before the nozzle leaves the petrol pump the first time you fill a hired or new motor, say "diesel" out loud. Silly, yes, yet it works.
- Thinking about something else is when this becomes an easy mistake to make, so tuck the phone away and keep your mind on the pump.
- Some diesels have a filler built to reject a petrol nozzle, and devices you can add exist for motors without one. Such an inhibitor helps up to a point — as a safety net, not a reason to stop reading the petrol pump.
- As soon as you notice, stop: less petrol inside your tank makes a thinner mix. What to do next does not change, though — still do not crank it.
Put petrol in a diesel in Rock End already?
The order of things is brief, then. Do not start it, and do not switch your ignition on. The staff on the forecourt — whether at Texaco itself or wherever you filled up — will usually help roll it away from the petrol pump if you ask. Call 0333 366 0103 next, with three facts — your fuel, the approximate volume, and whether it has run.
Say so if it was AdBlue instead of petrol: it is a different issue, with its own page for Rock End, because AdBlue brings corrosion and deposits instead of lost protection.
What makes one Rock End petrol in a diesel job cost more than the next
An honest single quote does not exist here: four situations, four separate tasks. Mostly, your cost moves with which one you're in. Where the vehicle is matters too, and whether a technician can safely reach it, after the share of petrol to what the tank holds.
Three queries come first, before quoting, instead of after — what got in, how much, has it run — and that is the reason. Those answers turn a range into a straight figure.
About Rock End and its setting
Rock End is a small locality in Staffordshire, situated on the riverside with nearby villages such as Knypersley and Braddocks Hay. Rock End sits at an elevation of 241 metres, overlooking the surrounding countryside, and is located approximately 5.8 miles from Stoke-on-Trent. Rock End has a population of around 510 people, predominantly living in detached houses. Rock End is also near other local places like Robin Hill, and is about 139.8 miles from London.
Rock End and Staffordshire: where our fuel drain cover reaches
Our vans answering petrol in diesel calls in Rock End, in the ST postcode area, equally work the locations around it, Knypersley, Braddocks Hay and Robin Hill included. No need to bring your vehicle to us. Forecourts, supermarket car parks, lay-bys and your own driveway are all spots where we work.
Still at the petrol pump in Rock End?
Then, you could not be in a better position. Ring, and leave it switched off.