Diesel not Petrol

Cute_Mouse

I have screwed up and put petrol in a diesel car. I have called out the auto services and they are draining the car as we speak. What is the chance of it working again? I placed £5.00 of unleaded petrol in the car this morning and have driven about 20 miles. I arrived home and came to start the car again. It would not start, engine turned but did not fire. When I reflect on situation I don’t know if I put petrol or diesel in the car last time I filled up (again it was only a fiver). Sillly me.

Rolandtheroadie

Put petrol in the wifes car yesterday (£2.68 worth before I realised) put 60 litres of diesel on top, all seems ok. So you may be lucky, more modern diesels might not like it though.

LandyAndy

Fill it with diesel now and just drive, normally. Any damage done will have happened already and won't be ongoing if you've had the rest drained out. I suspect you will be Ok and I don't see the point of replaceing a number of expensive components on the 'off chance'.

As an aside. Fuelling up £5 at a time? That has to be mad, doesn't it?

flyingscotno1

LandyAndy wrote: »

As an aside. Fuelling up £5 at a time? That has to be mad, doesn't it?

Not that mad, but only 3/4 litres or so and likely to only get you 30 miles.

moonrakerz

Diesel in a petrol engine doesn't do much harm at all. Petrol in a diesel engine can do a lot of damage, especially to the high pressure injector pump.
The pump relies on the Diesel to lubricate it - petrol doesn't do this.

LandyAndy

flyingscotno1 wrote: »

Not that mad, but only 3/4 litres or so and likely to only get you 30 miles.

Even if the fuel station is on your route it still strikes me as monumental waste of time.:( If you have to go out of your way it wastes more time and some money.

LandyAndy

moonrakerz wrote: »

Diesel in a petrol engine doesn't do much harm at all. Petrol in a diesel engine can do a lot of damage, especially to the high pressure injector pump.
The pump relies on the Diesel to lubricate it - petrol doesn't do this.

Quite right but the point is 'can' not 'will'. I still wouldn't be changing parts on the off chance.

A friend of mine filled his diesel Focus with petrol and only realised when he had driven a few miles home. He drained it and used the petrol in his Triumph Herald pickup, refilled the focus with diesel and had no long term problems.

Ebe_Scrooge

Not trying to cause any arguments here, just genuine curiosity :

Does it REALLY harm a diesel engine to have a little bit of petrol in it ? I only ask because I remember, many years ago, it was accepted wisdom to actually add a little bit of petrol to a diesel tank during winter to stop the diesel from freezing. I appreciate modern diesel engines might be fussier, but if you accidentally added, say, 5 litres of petrol to a 65 litre tank of diesel, would it actually cause any damage ?

Inactive

LandyAndy wrote: »

Even if the fuel station is on your route it still strikes me as monumental waste of time.:( If you have to go out of your way it wastes more time and some money.

Not forgetting, the way fuel prices are increasing there is a good chance that the price will have increased by the time the OP is ready to put their next fiver's worth in.;)

rev_henry

Ebe_Scrooge wrote: »

Not trying to cause any arguments here, just genuine curiosity :

Does it REALLY harm a diesel engine to have a little bit of petrol in it ? I only ask because I remember, many years ago, it was accepted wisdom to actually add a little bit of petrol to a diesel tank during winter to stop the diesel from freezing. I appreciate modern diesel engines might be fussier, but if you accidentally added, say, 5 litres of petrol to a 65 litre tank of diesel, would it actually cause any damage ?

I think newer diesels are much more fussy, especially if Common Rail.

username

LandyAndy wrote: »

Even if the fuel station is on your route it still strikes me as monumental waste of time.:( If you have to go out of your way it wastes more time and some money.

I don't get why people are so 'obsessive' about filling up to a round number, like £5, £10 etc. Every time I pull upto a pump, I more often than not find it's on one of these round figures.