Near Disaster To Superb Outcome

[The Cav]

Back a few weeks ago on a rather cold dinner time I was using a self serve petrol pump the sort you put your visa card into

it was a cold day and I glanced down at the options available... Petrol ...Diesel..Super Petrol...Super Diesel ...I noticed a button under the diesel hose that said fast delivery for HGV

not thinking I went for the next hose that I thought was for Diesel cars that was the same colour and proceded to fill up my Avensis 2.2 Tspirit....Suddenly I got a strong whiff of petrol....yes Guys I was filling up with unleaded

I stopped instantly ..7 Lts of unleaded in the tank later..So I then brimmed the tank with Diesel

Apart for the Occasional difficulty starting ....and topping up with Diesel every time the Gauge moved of the full to 3/4 full I carried on using the car

I was obviously very lucky that I managed to stop before I went too far filling with the unleaded

So what is the superb Outcome I hear you say

My Avensis has always been a bit smokey on acceleration

Previously

Ive tried every brand of injector cleaner

Ive replaced the EGR valve with another

Ive cleaned the mass air flow sensor

All to no avail...

Until now

what ever was causing my Avensis to smoke has been eradicated by the petrol

not a bit of black smoke at any speed when accelerating even slow in high gear (previously trying to accelerate at 30mph in 4th would leave enough smoke to represent a smoke screen )

Well not now absolutely no smoke ...smooth acceleration a totally different motor

All Ive done since the petrol episode is have an oil change and fuel filter change

But honestly what ever was sticky or whatever was causing the smoke ...its now gone

BTW ...Im not advocating what happened to me should be tried ..but I had tried every type of injector cleaner including the expensive ones that people recommend on this forum ...none have been successful

But one silly near disaster has transformed my 120,000 mile Avensis 2.2 d4d into a smooth smoke free joy to drive Motor

[Raistlin]

How's that song go...


Some guys have all the luck

[t-spiritpete]

Nice one Cav, not heard from you for a while mate,

many years ago we used to add some petrol to the diesel tanks on HGV's when the weather was really really cold to help stop the derv waxing .... but not to the extent you did!!

Don't want to start a debate again but adding PURE Acetone into derv has a similar effect to your experience.

Nice to see you come out a winner with that bit of luck, unlike Liverpools bad luck at the weekend, still you can't win them all mate.

Pete.

[Parts-King]

I remember the days of lighting fires under the diesel tanks of lorries to free up the fuel in the tanks during winter :eek:

Putting petrol in the diesel tanks was one of the ways of stopping the fuel waxing before the creation of anti waxing agents

Kingo

[Mike169]

Done this one myself and it made no bad running to the engine and if anything it ran better afterwards. I had an old 1986 diesel astra van 1600cc, quite a basic engine. Anyway i was stressed at the time and by mistake i put in half a tank of petrol to match the other half of diesel in the tank already......i thought 'you twat', my home was only 300 yards away so i decided to drive home thinking there would be enough 100% diesel in the filter and pipes to get me home. So the next morning i gingerly started it up waiting for excessive diesel knock, it always started well and it started ok. I left it ticking over for a while and it sounded fine, ok i thought time to carefully take it round the block to see what happens. Cut a long story short it ran no differently on it's 50/50 mix and each time it got to 3/4 i'd top it up with diesel again and after about the 4th time i ran it almost empty and filled it with diesel. I can honestly say it performed exactly the same, no extra diesel knocking, same acceleration, same mpg and i feel the injectors probably got their tips cleaned off with the petrol burning off the injector nozzles. Not something i would recommend doing as modern cars seem more fussy about their fuel but i certainly had a lucky escape!

[Konrad C]

That is my moto - make the most of a bad situation.

Well today I nearly did the reverse and put diesel into my petrol (not concentrating)!

Lucky there is a restricting device at top of the filler.

Happy ending.

[My first toyota]

That is my moto - make the most of a bad situation.

Well today I nearly did the reverse and put diesel into my petrol (not concentrating)!

Lucky there is a restricting device at top of the filler.

Happy ending.

Thats right. A diesel pump wont fit into a petrol car but a petrol one will go into a diesel tank.

I know some people who put a pounds worth of petrol in with half a tank of diesel. They're adamant it does wonders for their cars. Ill stick to forte.

[Cyker]

Phew, lucky escape mate!

Petrol is much more reactive/corrosive than diesel so maybe it dissolved some stubborn deposits? :)

Diesel engines can theoretically run on almost any combustible fuel, in the case of petrol the worse quality and lower octane, the better! The main reason petrol is dangerous to diesels is it doesn't lubricate the injectors like diesel does, which can quickly cause them to fail...

[cfc]

The main problem is with the high pressure fuel pump which diesels use, it is made to very close tolerances and relies on the diesel to lubricate it which of course petrol will not do. However, 7 Ltrs of petrol mixed with plenty of diesel should not be a problem. Good Luck!