Wigginton: Petrol in a Diesel Car? How Worried to Be
Less than you likely are, if it hasn't been started. Till the ignition primes your pump, the starter turns, or the vehicle is driven, petrol in a diesel tank simply sits there and does nothing. Which means the honest reply to that first Wigginton query — "have I wrecked it?" — normally no. To keep it that way, phone Petrol in Diesel and leave your motor alone. What petrol really does to a diesel, how to judge how far it's gone, and how to stop it from happening again: that is the remainder of this page.
Your engine and petrol in a diesel: what goes on
On its way through a motor, diesel has two tasks. It combusts, and before it ignites it lubricates. The high-pressure pump and your injectors are built to very fine clearances, and the diesel passing through them is what keeps those surfaces from grinding against one another.
The second job petrol does not do at all, and the first it does badly. Being less viscous than diesel, petrol strips away the protection a fuel system needs, leaving a pump running on the mixture wearing itself. It's equally made to resist igniting under compression — the opposite of what a diesel needs — which is where you hear the rattling.
Put these together and the shape of the issue is plain. Contact does not do the harm — circulation does. Petrol in a tank is a fuel fault. The beginning 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 your injectors beyond it.
How serious is petrol in a diesel? Four situations we see in Wigginton
Fuelled, and never started: no case is better. That petrol is inside that tank and just your tank, and the job is a drain and a flush where the vehicle stands. This is the one situation that can only truly occur on a forecourt, since anywhere else the car has been driven to get there.
A moment's running, or merely your ignition on. Once primed, your system has pulled petrol out of your tank as far as the filter and the lines. Usually little more than emptying, purging and sorting your filter, so still straightforward.
Some miles driven, and the pump has spent each of them working on diluted fuel. The work is the tank, the fuel lines, your filter and clean fuel through the whole circuit, and how hard the vehicle was driven counts as much as how far. On the school run to St Bartholomew's Church of England Voluntary Aided Primary School, Wigginton, the mileage is short. Driving as far as St Albans, under 15 miles away, makes a very different task — as does any distance on the M1, under 10 miles from Wigginton, with the engine working hard the whole time.
Driven until it complained. Knocking, a ragged idle, smoke, a throttle that has gone soft. What you are hearing is your engine reporting fuel that no longer behaves like diesel. Whether it's the verge on Vicarage Road, a lay-by or a side street, stop where you are then leave it. What goes first is still the drain and flush-through, and that takes care of it, with long-term damage very unusual if a car is stopped quickly.
Stories Wigginton people hear about petrol in a diesel
False: topping up to full with diesel makes it fine. It does not. Nothing comes out when you top up — that tank simply holds more of the same blend. The idea behind that guidance — that diesel fuel systems tolerate petrol by percentage — is wrong.
Not so: a newer diesel copes with a bit of petrol. Rather, the opposite. At higher pressure, through more precise parts: that's how a current diesel handles its fuel, so the lubrication counts for more, not less.
"It starts, it drives, and so there is no harm" — the myth that catches more people than any other. A petrol engine fed diesel generally won't run, and so the motorist stops and the harm stops with them. Whilst your pump grinds, a diesel fed petrol usually starts, ticks over and drives away as if nothing has happened. Running is not the same as fine.
Myth: a two-stroke additive lets you to drive home. It was an old workaround, supposed for another problem. None of what petrol thinned gets put back by it — and later, the tank still contains the petrol.
"Drain it yourself and you're sorted" — a myth, because after it's been running some petrol lies in your filter and lines, ready to go straight back through the pump on the next start. On top of that, petrol cleared into a can by the road is truly dangerous.
Why petrol in a diesel happens so easily
On purpose? Never. Through carelessness? Rarely, if ever. The forecourt makes it easy: the petrol nozzle is the narrower of the two, and it slips into a diesel filler with almost no resistance, while a diesel nozzle generally won't go into a petrol vehicle at all. So the mistake runs one way.
Routine and the vehicle falling out of step is how it takes place. A vehicle that is new to you — hired, on loan as a courtesy car, or just bought. A household with one petrol and one diesel on the driveway. The pumps in a different order on a well-known forecourt. Fuelling up in a hurry en route to Tring, with a train to catch. Exactly the moment it occurs: after years of driving petrol, someone fills a diesel Volkswagen Passat for the first time. Throw in a back seat full of kids, a phone call or rain, and habit wins.
Next time you fill up in Wigginton: avoiding petrol in a diesel
- 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 hint.
- In a motor you don't know, look inside the flap over your filler or at the cap before the first fill: many motors print the fuel type there.
- A coloured fob or a sticker on your diesel's key achieves more than any amount of meaning to remember, in a household with one of each.
- "Diesel", out loud, before you lift the nozzle — each time a new or hired car needs its first tank. It sounds silly. It does the trick.
- Tuck the phone away. This is an easy mistake to make while you're thinking about something else.
- A misfuel inhibitor helps, up to a point. Some diesels come with a filler designed to reject a petrol nozzle, and add-on devices exist for motors without one. They are a safety net, not a reason to stop checking the pump.
- Less petrol means a weaker mixture, and so stop the moment you notice — while remembering that the next stage is unchanged. It is still not to fire it up.
Put petrol in a diesel in Wigginton already?
In that case, there is just a short order of things. Never fire it up, and do not turn the ignition on. The staff at the forecourt — whether at Texaco itself or wherever you filled up — will usually help push it clear of the pump if you ask. Then ring 0333 366 0103 and tell us what went in, about how much, and if it has run.
If it was AdBlue and not petrol, say so. That's a different fault — corrosion and deposits rather than lost lubrication — and it has its own page for Wigginton.
What makes one Wigginton petrol in a diesel task cost more than the next
There's no fair single quote for this, because the four scenarios above are four separate tasks. Mostly, your cost shifts with which situation you're in. Two things follow that: the petrol that went in as a proportion of what the tank holds, then the place the vehicle is in and whether a van can reach it safely.
Before any quote, not after, come three queries: the fuel that was put in, the quantity, and if it's run. That is why. Those answers turn a range into a straight figure.
About Wigginton
Wigginton is a rural village in Hertfordshire, situated inland at an elevation of 211 metres, with Wigginton being close to several nearby places including Wigginton Bottom, Upper Dunsley, and New Ground. Wigginton has a population of approximately 813 residents, with Wigginton being characterised by predominantly detached housing. Wigginton is located 29 miles from London and 13 miles from the nearest city, St Albans.
Fuel drain cover around Wigginton and across Hertfordshire
Our vans answering petrol in diesel calls in Wigginton, in the HP postcode area, also work the spots near it, Wigginton Bottom, Upper Dunsley and New Ground among them. The vehicle does not need to come to us: our technicians drain at a forecourt, in a supermarket car park, in a lay-by or on your own drive.
Still at the pump around Wigginton?
Then you are in the best spot there is. Keep it off. Phone.