guess who filled his diesel merc with petrol?

[Steve A]

Me of course!

[bewva]

I filled a petrol car with diesel once. A full tanks worth too.

[Scunner]

Oh no Steve

Which way round is worst? Or are they equally disastrous?

[Diverbaz 1]

I had a long term hire car which was supplied by the company I worked for (civil service) which I was not allowed to use at weekends for personal use, so had my own car as well. The hire car was petrol my car was diesel. Pulled into a garage to fill up one weekend and was putting petrol into my car, had a couple of gallons in before I realized, ended up finishing topping up with diesel and the car ran fine.

[Scunner]

Yes didn't truckers put a dash of petrol in their diesel when it was really cold? I also remember hearing that the pump nozzles are different sizes these days, so at least that would make one way of doing it impossible.

[Scunner]

I put £30 in my mean machine today, I was shocked that the guy in the queue to pay in front of me had managed to squeeze £433 into his. But it wasn't all down to high fuel prices.

[Jim Fraser]

A small drop of petrol in a diesel will do no real harm, but have seen cylinder heads cracked and pistons holed (sounds painfull) when fuel tank was near full of the wrong stuff.
Another ''good'' additive for older diesel engines is acetone (yes nail varnish remover) - 100ml to a tankfull - cleans up the injectors etc and raises the cetane rating slightly, but not so good on modern ones as it can perish seals and joints.

[angela]

someone well known to me put petrol in a diesel courtesy car and blamed me. Dirty rotten trick!!

[Supacabby]

Very common occurrence!

The tip is NOT to use a main dealer or any of the breakdowns specialist "fuel drain" guys, they are extortionate & there is no need. I know of a BMW owner who ended up with a £5k bill including a new fuel tank as he was told the tank was "polluted indefinitely".

If you have a good quality local garage they will simply use an electric pump to drain the fuel straight through the system bypassing the filter, flush the system with an additive, fit new filters, refill & drive away, average of appx £200 + the replacement fuel (dependant on the the disposal fee which depends on the local council). I used to do them at the roadside but this is no longer allowed due to the spillage & disposal rules, takes a bout an hour or 2 at most.

As for damage limitation, if you realise what you've done before you start the engine then even easier as there's only the tank to drain. If the vehicle has been run petrol in diesel won't hurt too badly (will clear out the channels nicely!) but diesel in petrol tends to sludge things up as it's an oil based fuel so you may need new plugs etc. Only real complication is the modern day electronic systems may need resetting as they will show a "fault" even after the drain out.

[jondo]

Guilty! Put petrol in my Mazda 6 D Turbo back in August. I did about 20 miles wondering why the engine sounded rough but soldiered on to a meeting. After the meeting the engine refused to start. Cost £200 through the RAC to have it drained, flushed and refuelled. 3 hours wasted + cost of the petrol + £200!

Car's ok now but be wary. You'd think, Scunner, but you can still get the nozzles in far enough, and if you're having a dopey day.........!