A friend of mine is embroiled in a long-term neighbour dispute whch has caused all sorts of nastiness. The Sunday night before last he filled his VW Polo TDi with diesel at the local garage, and he has the receipt that proves it was diesel he put in. The next morning, very early, he set off to work far away, but when he'd gone 85 miles, about half of which was on the motorway, his car broke down. It was taken to a reputable dealer who diagnosed complete engine failure. I'm not sure of the detail, but I think that all the valves and pistons were kaput due to excessive engine temperature. The garage found petrol in the fuel system. The engine etc of the Polo has had to be replaced at a cost of £3000 plus.
A couple of questions for those that know:
1) Could the small amount of petrol (up to 5 litres perhaps) that it might be possible to squeeze into a 'full' diesel tank be enough to wreck a TDi engine?
2) What would the symptoms of such contamination be? I thought that contamination ruined the high-pressure fuel pump and injectors through lack of lubrication.
Out of interest, the garage where the fuel was obtained has been given a clean bill of health, and the one that replaced the engine is above suspiscion too. Hence the fear of sabotage.
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I put 6 litres of petrol into my nearly empty 405 TD's tank, before realising my mistake. I then filled up with diesel (45+ litres), and had no problems all the way through the tank, though I did top up with diesel gain when half-full.
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Yes, I think that the old-style low pressure Cit/Pug XUD engines aren't too bothered about petrol contamination, but what about a VW TDi?
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All modern cars for a number of years now must have lockable fuel caps or ones that can only released from inside the car.
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My friend's fuel cap IS lockable - but on Sunday night he didn't bother to lock the car (he lives out in the sticks) so it would have been possible for someone to open the filler cap. It's locked now...
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Probably a little late now, but he would need to look for evidence of spilt fuel around the cap or on the ground. If it is indeed sabotage, petrol may not have been the only thing that went in the fuel tank.
May have been a cover to remove suspicion from something else. Short of finding some evidence and installing 24/7 CCTV not much you can do other than pay out to have the fuel fully analysed by a lab for any other substances....then you have to prove who did it....(Where are CSI when you need them?)
S. ( Yes I work in an Industrial Laboratory.)
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My friend's fuel cap IS lockable - but on Sunday night he didn't bother to lock the car (he lives out in the sticks) so it would have been possible for someone to open the filler cap. It's locked now...
I can't believe that anyone leaves a car unlocked overnight anywhere these days. For the sake of pressing one button he might have to shell out £3000!
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My friend's fuel cap IS lockable - but on Sunday night he didn't bother to lock the car .........
How daft can you get in today's lawless age?
--
L\'escargot.
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A 405 TD lump is so low tech it wouldn't matter about 6 litres of petrol being put in the tank.
You can run these PSA XUD / XUDT & TUD lumps on a mixture of diesel & old vegetable oil from the local chippy they are that low tech.
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Was the engine available for a post mortem, as it were, once removed? Wondered if such an examination would have revealed more than the initial diagnosis whilst in situ.
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"Could sabotage do this? "
Yes, but how are you going to prove it?
It is also possible that the contamination occured at the filling station.
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So Holmes what do you deduce?
Well Watson, Mr X claims he filled up his car with diesel on Sunday night,
Yes Holmes
Thereby Watson leaving very little room for any other "substance" to be added
Quite true Holmes
And yet Watson Mr X claims that no less than 80 miles down the road, his engine was wrecked, and we know Watson that it would take more then a couple of litres of poison to destroy this engine in such a short time.
You are saying Holmes?
I am saying Watson that the poison must have been added some time previously, as there was no room to add it that night.
By gad Holmes.
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TourVanMan TM < Ex RF >
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My thoughts too Holmes/Watson or whoever. Does he have receipts from further back which detail sans plomb rather than diesel? Maybe he keeps them for VAT reasons?
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Has he checked back with the petrol station in question that they didn't have the wrong substance in the wrong tanks? It's not unheard of.
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The fuel station has been checked and it doesn't seem to be any problem of their doing.
I'm afraid that I don't know the details of the engine damage, just that valves and pistons were involved rather than just the fuel system.
I agree that something nasty could have gone into the tank BEFORE the last batch of diesel, but all my friend's receipts are for diesel not petrol and he drove the car around all weekend before the failure without problems.
The question still is, does petrol in diesel lead to extreme engine temperatures and eventual engine failure?
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It was taken to a reputable dealer who diagnosed complete engine failure. I'm not sure of the detail, but I think that all the valves and pistons were kaput due to excessive engine temperature. The garage found petrol in the fuel system.
I didn't think petrol in diesel was enough to render valves and pistons "kaput". The lack of oiliness of the mixed fuel may well have rendered the diesel pump inoperative, but to cook the whole engine? Did your friend see any warning lights? Does he check oil and water before a long journey like the (ahem) rest of us?
My inclination is to agree with our VW-driving friend, Holmes and his tight-lipped sidekick; there isn't a simple answer to this one.
And 2 garages "above suspicion" in the same locale; that's unusual in itself.
Hawkeye
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Stranger in a strange land
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Thanks for your input, Hawkeye. I didn't think that petrol in diesel would cause overheating either, but I wanted to check.
My friend isn't particularly mechanically sympathetic and I too would like to know if he neglected the routine oil and water checks, but it's not easy to ask without implying that I doubt his capabilities! He's also convinced himself that sabotage is the most likely cause of his problems.
The garages aren't close together by the way. The fuel supplier is a local that my wife and I use all the time - no-one else is reporting problems - and the repairing garage is miles away and a main dealer.
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My experience of sabotage is that it is often (99% of the time) blamed for an event which seemed inexplicable at the time but which subsequently turned out to be caused by gross incompetence or neglect by the user...
If your friend is not mechanically competent he is in no position to make ANY judgement at all on the cause of his engine's demise - let alone blame someone else.
Ask gently if he had checked the oil and water levels in the month prior to the problem and if so when. If he says no, then chances are it's all his fault as he cannot say that oil and water levels were correct. If he has not opened the bonnet in that time, odds are 90% plus it's his neglect that is to blame..
I suspect he may be more honest if you ask him when he checked the levels rather than IF..
madf
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Doesn't sound like sabotage to me-5l of petrol diluted into a tankful of diesel would not cause engine failure. And ask yourself this-if you wanted to sabotage a motor, what could you put into the fuel tank that would let the car go 85 miles, and then completely destroy the engine? I can't think of anything (doesn't mean there isn't anything of course).
As has been said-you can bet your hide the car was low on coolant, oil, or both.
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Simple explanation would be some neglect of oil replenishment or quality. Was it a PD engine? Paranoia gulch: sugar dissolved in petrol. Injectors partially clogged, excess droplet size causes overheating of pistons and valves due to burning after exhaust valves open. Although I'd have thought the engine would be running badly before demise.
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Everybody knows that a swan can beak a man's arm, and putting sugar in the petrol will wreck a car engine - except it wouldn't apparently -
www.snopes.com/autos/grace/sugar.asp
My money's on loss of/lack of coolant, or loss of oil pressure (low level/pump failure?) but in any case overheating sounds to have been ignored, as it usually is by the non-mechanically minded. My car mechanic pal can testify to this - more than a few of his customers have cooked their engines due to one problem or another (including HGF), and admitted they ignored warning lights etc because "there didn't seem to be anything wrong with it so I just carried on - should I have stopped?".
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If there was a trace of petrol could the friend have misfueled some time ago and got away with it. Now it has failed trying to allege neighbour did this.
Maybe the neoighbour did but without proof.... and yes there is a receipt saying filled to the brim with diesel on last fill.... but what if filled to the brim just after 5 litres of petrol put in by mistake. Not saying it was but there'd always be a doubt.
I think it is impossible to prove who put the petrol in, if indeed it was the reason for failure. And not locking the car, hence the filler cap, means anybody including me could have done this.
Without hard evidence I think he has no option but to pay up even if it was sabotage. And it might not have been.
A question.... do VW PDi engines take biodiesel? I know a some diesel cars gone into my local Ford diesel with problems caused by Biodiesel. Ford's manual states you should not use biodiesel in the TDCi engines - at least mine does.
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A question.... do VW PDi engines take biodiesel? I know a some diesel cars gone into my local Ford diesel with problems caused by Biodiesel. Ford's manual states you should not use biodiesel in the TDCi engines - at least mine does.
My 55 reg Mondeo TDCi Handbook says fuels which contain up to 5% biodiesel are acceptable.
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My Mondeo 2003 TDCi Euro IV says no biodiesel.... so it's changed.
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Kith: My 55 reg Mondeo TDCi Handbook says fuels which contain up to 5% biodiesel are acceptable.
rtj70: My Mondeo 2003 TDCi Euro IV says no biodiesel.... so it's changed.
Guys, I think it depends whether you read the "Filling station guide" inside the back cover which says no RME, not never nohow or the section on Fuel further inside, which says that up to 5% RME is OK. Good ol' Ford handbooks.
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that would let the car go 85miles, and then completely destroy the engine? I can't think of anything (doesn't mean there isn't anything of course).
Carborundum powder? Sand? >>
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Carborundum powder? Sand? >>
Fuel filter would have trapped any solids surely?
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Me thinks contaminated fuel at the local garage, get a sample from the tank, get it analysed and get a solicitor, £3000 is a lot of money.
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Petrol in the Diesel is a 'Red herring'. Fuel contamination would damage the fuel system, but not cause overheating. I think he needs to look elsewhere for a fault - maybe a failed head gasket, rad, hose etc.
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Now that it appears to have been established that 5 litres of petrol in a modern TDi would not have this catastrophic effect one has to think of other 'things' in diesel that could wrech the engine.
How learned is this neighbour? Would he/she know what sort of liquids to put in a diesel tank that would wreck the engine and would he/she be able to get hold of them. For example, 5 litres of acetone or trichloroethylene would certainly do far, far more damage than petrol. As would a liquid that thickens the diesel (such as some of the thicker glycols). Careful analysis (FTIR or GC-MS) should be able to distinguish such contaminants.
Analysis of the fuel would quickly reveal whether particulates have been added (as suggested above), including things like T-cut, as these would either settle in the tank, get trapped in the fuel filter or, block the injection nozzles.
In short, I think that sabotage is less likely than gradual lack of cooling to an engine.
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I've twice put 5 or so litres of petrol in my PD engined Golf and then topped up the tank with diesel with no long term problems (its 4 years since I last did it). The only noticeable effects were slightly sluggish performance (I took it easy on those tanks of fuel anyway) and poor hot starting.
Cambelt snapped / no oil / no coolant / or HG failure would be my guess.
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Thanks to everyone for your inputs. The consensus seems to be that 5 litres of petrol in a tank of diesel would NOT wreck the engine. Analysis has shown that there was definitely petrol in there, but its origin will remain a mystery.
Looks like a few gentle enquiries about when oil and water checks were done would be in order...
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Petrol in the Diesel is a 'Red herring'. Fuel contamination would damage the fuel system, but not cause overheating. I think he needs to look elsewhere for a fault - maybe a failed head gasket, rad, hose etc.
Water in the fuel?
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Could it not have simply been a timing belt/chain failure? The mention of pistons and valves?
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Wh pays the £3,000 - insurers?
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Wh pays the £3,000 - insurers?
Insurers don't cover mechanical breakdowns.
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I think warranty direct might pay but perhaps not in these circumstances.
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