Petrol in diesel fuel tank - what should I do?
Discussion
I had exactly the same problem,i filled my tank on my landcruiser to the top with petrol (its a diesel car!) at 2am 100 miles away from home in leeds!! what do i do now? fortunately when i went back into the filling station the man had seen this all too many times before and passed me a leaflet and told me to call them. the company was called Forecourt Assist and baring in mind its 2am i called.and within 20 mins a swish van pulled up and a very polite man drained all the fuel out of my car and cleaned out all the fuel lines etc and i was driving back home within an hour of making the call. their price was only £170 and am very gratefull for an amazing service that i dint know even existed. im not sure what areas they cover but i believe they do have a web site.
Hi there. I need some advice. I've accidentally put about 18 litres of petrol in my 2000 1.9TD Vectra. There was over 10 litres of diesel in it and then I've put around 30 litres of diesel. I started the car all right but the engine wasn't running as it should be. I drove it for 10-15 minutes and switched it off. It didn't want to start any more I tried to start it by pulling it on a rope twice and then i gave up thinking the best way to solve it is a mechanic. Just wanted to know if I could do any damage to the engine and fuel system??? Appreciate any advice. Thank you.
Edited by Pes_PL on Thursday 13th November 00:54
There are a lot of us about ! I have just put 12 litres of unleaded into half a tank (30/35 ltrs) of diesel in my 4 year old Audi A4 Avant. Cashier kindly phoned local motor engineers (who apparently deal with this a lot) on my behalf and I was advised to brim with diesel and drive on. This I did (adding another 25 lts of diesel), and made the 1 mile trip home OK. I then went on to the net and scared myself to death with all the gloom and doom messages and conflicting advice/comments!! So I called the engineer who had advised me earlier and told him of my fears. He confirmed that, in his opinion, providing I keep my tank topped up with diesel pretty regularly all should be well. He assured me that there would be sufficient lubricant in the diesel element and even confided to me that on occasions when they have drained a tank with similar proportions of diesel/petrol mix, he has transferred it straight into his own diesel van !! I will endeavour to update this site over the next few weeks....
Ok SO many people are doing this!!! Here's my story. I have a Y-reg Peugeot 206 and last night I was running dangerously empty and was fearful that I would not make it to a station so a friend went & filled up a gas can & added to my tank for me to be safe. Unfortunately he bought petrol!! I drove about 4 minutes before he realised his error and I pulled over immediately & turned off the engine. It was running perfectly at that time and I would not have noticed had he not said anything.
There are so many conflicting stories here! Can I top up with diesel and be ok? The needle is still on empty so it will be a full tank of diesel. I need to drive from Edinburgh to London tomorrow! I have not turned the car back on since then. What should I do? I'm parked at a gas station.
There are so many conflicting stories here! Can I top up with diesel and be ok? The needle is still on empty so it will be a full tank of diesel. I need to drive from Edinburgh to London tomorrow! I have not turned the car back on since then. What should I do? I'm parked at a gas station.
Peugot206 said:
Ok SO many people are doing this!!! Here's my story. I have a Y-reg Peugeot 206 and last night I was running dangerously empty and was fearful that I would not make it to a station so a friend went & filled up a gas can & added to my tank for me to be safe. Unfortunately he bought petrol!! I drove about 4 minutes before he realised his error and I pulled over immediately & turned off the engine. It was running perfectly at that time and I would not have noticed had he not said anything.
There are so many conflicting stories here! Can I top up with diesel and be ok? The needle is still on empty so it will be a full tank of diesel. I need to drive from Edinburgh to London tomorrow! I have not turned the car back on since then. What should I do? I'm parked at a gas station.
Are you American? If not, it's PETROL!There are so many conflicting stories here! Can I top up with diesel and be ok? The needle is still on empty so it will be a full tank of diesel. I need to drive from Edinburgh to London tomorrow! I have not turned the car back on since then. What should I do? I'm parked at a gas station.
Just read this in this weeks Autocar about this very issue,and how designer Peter Stevens dealt with it in his Audi.'I just added a couple of litres of two-stroke oil in to prevent the injector pump from running out of lubrication,then drove the 17 miles home.Next morning siphoned it out and refilled with diesel.I owned the car for a couple of years more and it always worked perfectly'.
I just put 15 litres of petrol into my x reg diesel astravan, the first time I ever got it wrong, and then suddenly realised what I'd done so I topped up with another 35 litres of diesel to the brim, then drove for another 50 miles with no problems at all maybe running abit hot. I have been advised to drain the tank which is a costly procedure and i lose £60 worth of fuel at the same time. I have about 125,000 miles on the clock so I figure i just take the risk and keep topping tank to full on diesel and I should be ok. I know you can get away with 10% petrol to diesel and the ratio at the moment is around 30% but if I keep topping up this will soon be reduced.
The thread that just keeps on going 
Today I put 3.2lts of unleaded petrol into my 1993 Nissan Serena T diesel that had about 40ltrs of diesel already in it and then drove it about 6klm and then topped the tank up to full.60ltrs total.Started and run OK when I returned the 2klms home.
After reading all the horror predictions online about what seems a reasonably common mistake ,you would think that this thread would be full of horror stories !! No ??
I'm going with the top up and drive approach and I'll look into the 2 stroke oil add in the tank idea as well.
fingers crossed
Today I put 3.2lts of unleaded petrol into my 1993 Nissan Serena T diesel that had about 40ltrs of diesel already in it and then drove it about 6klm and then topped the tank up to full.60ltrs total.Started and run OK when I returned the 2klms home.
After reading all the horror predictions online about what seems a reasonably common mistake ,you would think that this thread would be full of horror stories !! No ??
I'm going with the top up and drive approach and I'll look into the 2 stroke oil add in the tank idea as well.
fingers crossed
Sorry about reviving this topic, but I am on a pretty urgent situation.
Having rented a car in Spain (Seat Ibiza 1.6 TDI 2010) and having 1/4 of the tank left I felt like filling it up. Stopped at the gas station, looked at the car's documents, read "gasoil". Thought to myself it was Petrol in Spanish for some stupid reason. Topped it resulting in a mixture of 1/4 diesel and 3/4 petrol. Drove around 15 miles until my destination and on the way noticed that the car was not in its best moments but just ignored it.
Couple of hours later, came back to the car and tried to start the engine two times to no avail. Just at this time I realized that I might have done a stupid thing. Picked up the car manual to read that it was a Diesel motored vehicle.
I know I made some of basic mistakes, not asking the fuel at the rental place, making wrong assumptions (gasoil) and trying to start the engine twice, and obviously I couldn't understand less about cars.
The rental contract clearly says that damages caused by fueling mistakes are not covered and I will even have to pay for the towing to the nearest shop (20miles). I read some similar rental, petrol-on-diesel stories and they don't end well (around 1800 euros).
Right know I am thinking about towing the car to the nearest shop (40 euros) in the city I am in. I talked to the mechanic and he said he would drain the petrol out for 30 euros and that he believed that doing so and topping it up with diesel should be all it takes to have the car running again.
After reading the previous posts I don't believe that simply draining the petrol out will fix the problem as the engine has petrol all over it (ran for 15 miles and tried to start it twice after that). Still I think it is a reasonable cost (70 euros) to have before calling the rental company's assistance and ending up spending a couple of thousand euros. The different opinions and contrasting cases all over the internet don't help also.
What do you guys thinks? Thanks in advance and sorry about the long post.
Having rented a car in Spain (Seat Ibiza 1.6 TDI 2010) and having 1/4 of the tank left I felt like filling it up. Stopped at the gas station, looked at the car's documents, read "gasoil". Thought to myself it was Petrol in Spanish for some stupid reason. Topped it resulting in a mixture of 1/4 diesel and 3/4 petrol. Drove around 15 miles until my destination and on the way noticed that the car was not in its best moments but just ignored it.
Couple of hours later, came back to the car and tried to start the engine two times to no avail. Just at this time I realized that I might have done a stupid thing. Picked up the car manual to read that it was a Diesel motored vehicle.
I know I made some of basic mistakes, not asking the fuel at the rental place, making wrong assumptions (gasoil) and trying to start the engine twice, and obviously I couldn't understand less about cars.
The rental contract clearly says that damages caused by fueling mistakes are not covered and I will even have to pay for the towing to the nearest shop (20miles). I read some similar rental, petrol-on-diesel stories and they don't end well (around 1800 euros).
Right know I am thinking about towing the car to the nearest shop (40 euros) in the city I am in. I talked to the mechanic and he said he would drain the petrol out for 30 euros and that he believed that doing so and topping it up with diesel should be all it takes to have the car running again.
After reading the previous posts I don't believe that simply draining the petrol out will fix the problem as the engine has petrol all over it (ran for 15 miles and tried to start it twice after that). Still I think it is a reasonable cost (70 euros) to have before calling the rental company's assistance and ending up spending a couple of thousand euros. The different opinions and contrasting cases all over the internet don't help also.
What do you guys thinks? Thanks in advance and sorry about the long post.
paul78eu said:
Yes thanks! But from an expert's perspective, should I be hopeful?
Impossible to say.On older / simpler cars - yes I've fixed many like this.
With modern ones it's a lottery.
If it were my money I'd certainly try it first.
BTW I've just deliberately added a gallon of petrol to my biodiesel to help it run in the cold - but my diesels are yr 2000.
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