Petrol in Diesel car

[zuby84]

Hey there,

One of my friends has put 20 quid worth of petrol in a modern diesel Peugot 207. The car has been driven afterwards, but is not starting anymore. Just waiting for RAC to come and tow it away, but do you think a simple drainage will do or would it have messed up the inner workings of the car? I've heard stories that it can sometimes cost £2000 to get this fixed.

Cheers

[j44esd]

Not the best news i'm afraid, but hope this helps:

http://motortorque.askaprice.com/articles/auto-071...

Regards

j44esd

[mikechandler]

zuby84 said:

Hey there,

One of my friends has put 20 quid worth of petrol in a modern diesel Peugot 207. The car has been driven afterwards, but is not starting anymore. Just waiting for RAC to come and tow it away, but do you think a simple drainage will do or would it have messed up the inner workings of the car? I've heard stories that it can sometimes cost £2000 to get this fixed.

Cheers

I know a couple of people who have done this and usually getting the tank drained does the trick

[Allanv]

Errrr..

I did this to my 320D a while back and drove it after as I still didnt notice what I had done.

Then it started to play up, and it got me to thinking and then the penny dropped. I still drove it the short way to the mechanics and a drain, new filters sorted it fine. Total cost £150 and that was with £23 worth of new fuel the garage put in.

[scoobydude]

Petrol in a diesel isn't the end of the world. Diesel in a petrol on the other hand is a real problem. Misfueling cars is a nightmare especialy for hire car companies

[CommanderJameson]

scoobydude said:

Petrol in a diesel isn't the end of the world. Diesel in a petrol on the other hand is a real problem.

I thought it was the other way around, due to the petrol stripping lubrication from things like fuel pumps.

[FamilyGuy]

I did this to my wife's MPV I had a petrol car at the time. I put a full tank of petrol into it and drove it 200m from the forecourt to the supermarket and when I came back it didn't start. All sorts of authoritative sites said there'd be horrible damage but almost all real experiences said a drain would be fine. In fact some who'd put in up to 30% petrol/diesel mix had just driven on, topping up with diesel ASAP with no problems.

The AA offered me a fixed price deal to sort it - IIRC about the 140GBP already mentioned. Use them. I later found they have subcontractors with specialist equipment that can extract it out of the filler (I think they pressurise the tank and it's forced back out their extraction pipe). Stupidly I thought my local garage would be cheaper. They weren't, removed the gauge sender to get it out and left the car reeking of fuel and I had to take it back as they'd broken the breather pipe. I was told later by one of the specialists that a large proportion of their costs is disposal of the contaminated fuel. I'd provided my garage with some jerry cans as I knew it was 99% petrol and ran my lawnmower on it for a summer

ETA: Oh - And no damage done - ran perfectly afterwards and that was several thousand miles ago.

Edited by FamilyGuy on Monday 29th June 21:08

[scoobydude]

CommanderJameson said:

scoobydude said:

Petrol in a diesel isn't the end of the world. Diesel in a petrol on the other hand is a real problem.

I thought it was the other way around, due to the petrol stripping lubrication from things like fuel pumps.

Nah the silicone additive in the diesel rogers the 02 sensor in the petrol car every time, which is a much bigger issue.

[CommanderJameson]

scoobydude said:

CommanderJameson said:

scoobydude said:

Petrol in a diesel isn't the end of the world. Diesel in a petrol on the other hand is a real problem.

I thought it was the other way around, due to the petrol stripping lubrication from things like fuel pumps.

Nah the silicone additive in the diesel rogers the 02 sensor in the petrol car every time, which is a much bigger issue.

Fair enough. I won't do that, then.

[annodomini2]

scoobydude said:

CommanderJameson said:

scoobydude said:

Petrol in a diesel isn't the end of the world. Diesel in a petrol on the other hand is a real problem.

I thought it was the other way around, due to the petrol stripping lubrication from things like fuel pumps.

Nah the silicone additive in the diesel rogers the 02 sensor in the petrol car every time, which is a much bigger issue.

Rubbish, Petrol in a Diesel can completely wreck the injection system, Diesel is used to lubricate the injection system and especially in common rail system this can lead to major failure.

The result being a typical £2-3k bill for a new injection system.

[Puddenchucker]

annodomini2 said:

scoobydude said:

CommanderJameson said:

scoobydude said:

Petrol in a diesel isn't the end of the world. Diesel in a petrol on the other hand is a real problem.

I thought it was the other way around, due to the petrol stripping lubrication from things like fuel pumps.

Nah the silicone additive in the diesel rogers the 02 sensor in the petrol car every time, which is a much bigger issue.

Rubbish, Petrol in a Diesel can completely wreck the injection system, Diesel is used to lubricate the injection system and especially in common rail system this can lead to major failure.

The result being a typical £2-3k bill for a new injection system.

Wot he said.

Putting diesel is a petrol engine can usally be rectified relatively simply by draining and flushing the system, and provided the engine hasn't been run for a prolonged period, damage is unlikely.

However, putting petrol in a diesel will result in significant damage to the fuel pump bu simply turning on the ignition and even more damage if the engine is run.

http://www.carpages.co.uk/news/mis-fuelling-29-05-...

[shalmaneser]

Puddenchucker said:

annodomini2 said:

scoobydude said:

CommanderJameson said:

scoobydude said:

Petrol in a diesel isn't the end of the world. Diesel in a petrol on the other hand is a real problem.

I thought it was the other way around, due to the petrol stripping lubrication from things like fuel pumps.

Nah the silicone additive in the diesel rogers the 02 sensor in the petrol car every time, which is a much bigger issue.

Rubbish, Petrol in a Diesel can completely wreck the injection system, Diesel is used to lubricate the injection system and especially in common rail system this can lead to major failure.

The result being a typical £2-3k bill for a new injection system.

Wot he said.

Putting diesel is a petrol engine can usally be rectified relatively simply by draining and flushing the system, and provided the engine hasn't been run for a prolonged period, damage is unlikely.

However, putting petrol in a diesel will result in significant damage to the fuel pump bu simply turning on the ignition and even more damage if the engine is run.

http://www.carpages.co.uk/news/mis-fuelling-29-05-...

What he said.

[tr7v8]

shalmaneser said:

Puddenchucker said:

annodomini2 said:

scoobydude said:

CommanderJameson said:

scoobydude said:

Petrol in a diesel isn't the end of the world. Diesel in a petrol on the other hand is a real problem.

I thought it was the other way around, due to the petrol stripping lubrication from things like fuel pumps.

Nah the silicone additive in the diesel rogers the 02 sensor in the petrol car every time, which is a much bigger issue.

Rubbish, Petrol in a Diesel can completely wreck the injection system, Diesel is used to lubricate the injection system and especially in common rail system this can lead to major failure.

The result being a typical £2-3k bill for a new injection system.

Wot he said.

Putting diesel is a petrol engine can usally be rectified relatively simply by draining and flushing the system, and provided the engine hasn't been run for a prolonged period, damage is unlikely.

However, putting petrol in a diesel will result in significant damage to the fuel pump bu simply turning on the ignition and even more damage if the engine is run.

http://www.carpages.co.uk/news/mis-fuelling-29-05-...

What he said.

So everyone says but I did it on my last Jag.I was in France & misfueled it & drove it 35ish miles. When Jag relayed it to home from frogland I drained the unleaded diesel fuel mix out & chucked some in the Porsche as it was neat unleaded. Changed the filter & put 20 litres of diesel in & away it went. Lasted 20K miles before I chopped it.

[The Ben]

mum damaged the head gasket on her 106 by putting petrol in the diesel...

Much worse putting petrol into diesel than diesel into petrol...

[MudSkipper]

I put petrol in my diesel 306dturbo bout 2 yrs ago.

I managed to put bout £25 of petrol into an almost empty tank. Didn't realise I'd done it until the car died on me about 1/4 mile down the road.
I drained all the fuel from the system, replaced the fuel filter then completely filled it with diesel (took over 60 litres!!) It didn't want to start at first but after about 20mins of turning the engine over it eventually fired up and was fine...It may have even ran slightly better

[Iain328]

You can get away with petrol in an older diesel (in moderation). In a common rail type diesel engine - forget it, as has been said, just starting the fuel pump can be enough to shag the thing. If you put petrol in a common rail engined car's tank then (assuming you realise before you've started the thing) just push it to the side of the forecourt and call the AA - don't even switch the ignition on.

[scoobydude]

Simple answer here is don't take too much notice of internet forum claptrap. Just put the correct fuel in your car and you wont have to worry. For the record a while back when Tesco had all the trouble with bad petrol knackering petrol engines, it was down to the silicone additive which was meant for the diesel storage tank being put in the petrol storage tank by mistake. This rogered the 02 sensors in the petrol cars in which it was used.

[FamilyGuy]

Iain328 said:

In a common rail type diesel engine - forget it, as has been said, just starting the fuel pump can be enough to shag the thing.

Surely the VW PS130 engine I miss-fuelled is a common rail? It's fine. As I said earlier and the posts on this thread kind of bear it out - those that have actually been there and done it say its usually fine.

[Silver940]

Wifey did this to our Passat many moons ago, new filter and drained and all was well ( Except the 180 quid it cost) Car still going fine her brother has it now, If anything it seemed to run better afterwards.

[salviablue]

SWIM knows of someone that sticks upto 1/4 petrol in with 3/4 diesel (full tank) in any old dirty diesel to pass emissions on an MOT with flying colours. Works a treat and no damage.