Garage filled car with diesel. It's not a diesel.

Nasher said:
Some diesel in a petrol isn't a massive problem, it might smoke a bit since a petrol engine won't burn it properly due to lack of compression. It's the other way round that can be a disaster.
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Not always, it depends on the age of the vehicle.

In - properly - cold countries you would routinely add petrol to diesel to keep it from waxing/freezing in the depths of winter, the owners manual used to specify the tollerences for doing so, but it’s not like people were overly bothered about getting the ratio exact as it was that cold. Also Having known many diesel owners who’ve filled with petrol and driven it till it stopped, it was usually just a case of draining the tank/lines, new filter and re-prime the system.

As to petrol in a diesel it’s a similar story, if it’s literally a few litres, then in the past you could neck it with petrol and keep filling the tank regularly. More than that and it’s drain/new filter/prime again.

Newer engines combined with technology like catalytic converters and other cleaner technologies mean you don’t want to do this on a more modern engine, but prior to 2005-2006 this was common practice.
 
The problem is diesel lubricates and petrol is a solvant. Without lubrication from the fuel the fuel pump in a diesel will desintegrate, which will then ruin the injectors, then the engine. If you fill it with petrol and drive until it grinds to a halt, the chances are it's already done some damage.
 
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Nasher said:
The problem is diesel lubricates and petrol doesn't. So if you put petrol in a diesel engine it won't get the lubrication it relies on and that can kill it.
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Historically some manufacturers stated up to 20% petrol could be added in very cold weather, the reason that changed afaik was due to modern high pressure injectors.
 
[FnG]magnolia said:
Morning all,

I stopped at services last night and the attendant put 55 litres of diesel in my petrol Legacy. Chap came and did the fuel evacuation piece, saying that there'll be no material damage. It's an old car so I'm not worried about it blowing up/breaking down for re-sale concerns but is there anything I should be wary of in terms of it playing up? The engine wasn't started before the diesel was removed and the car started perfectly and drove home ok as well.

Drama in a teacup or should I do anything further?
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Person that drained the fuel was correct, there should be no issues at all. Even if you had tried starting it it would have just run roughly for a while and then stopped as soon as any significant concentration of diesel came through.
 
As long as he's fully drained the tank and changed the filter and blew the lines out it should be fine :)

What car is it? and what engine?
 
Terminal_Boy said:
Still very common in the Balkans/Eastern Europe. Not uncommon in the southern states of the USA.
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Very common in the West/Mid-West, or at least it seemed that nearly every petrol station we filled at up through Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, N. Dakota and S. Dakota had service attendants. That said, they were mainly the 'Mom & Pop' type places.
 
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