Monthly Archives: January 2011
Wrong fuel, Fuel Drains & Misfueling – busier than ever
The one thing you can always predict in the fuel draining business….. is that it is totally unpredictable!. I used to think the weekends were busy, then that changed, then I thought Monday’s were quiet and that changed, In all my time doing this job I have yet to find a pattern, somedays 12 to 15 jobs, then 2, some days with 1 or 2, or even none which hasen’t happend for 6 months, – (yes we even did a fuel drain on christmas day).
There is normally a rush of misfuellings around end of month paydays when people fill up full tanks.
I gave up trying to establish patterns some time ago, but as a rule of thumb we get a call out nearly every morning between 7 and 8, drivers on route to work, or night shift workers going home,
People in North London seem to misfuel in the early hours of the morning more than anyone else
If someone misfuels close to home they often chance it and drive home – calling us when it won’t start again after wrong fuel
Most people are unaware that there are specialist fuel draining companies, who perform mobile fuel drains, and only find out about us when they start googling or asking around
Nobody who deals with us, ever wants to see us again in a professional capacity.
If you ever wonder how common misfueling is, next time you are in a petrol station, look for traffic cones on the pump islands, these are in place to be put behind misfueld vehicles, 3 to 4 misfuellings a week is not unusual for a busy station, misfuellings are bad business for petrol stations, they can block pump lanes and cause traffic to que on the street, most petrol stations have details of mobile fuel draining companies to hand, a small handfull of corporately run petrol stations have exclusive agreements with the AA that prevents other mobile fuel draining companies from attending, this is anti competitive and the loser is the unlucky person who has to pay the AA an inflated price for a fuel drain, I think that a contributory factor could have been the petrol stations past experience with dangerous DIY fuel draining attempts being made on the forecourts, or uninsured, ill equipped and amateur companies doing fuel drains on the premises,Good practice for any mobile fuel drainer is to introduce yourself to the manager on arrival and agree a safe and convenient area to perform the fuel drain, I find petrol station staff are helpful and friendly and enjoy working with them.
That said, the past week has been extremely busy and I could do with a few quiet days to catch up with some office work
Take care,
Another busy day for wrong fuel
Today 8 unlucky drivers met me, seems to be very busy at this time of year, maybe its the weather, take care when your filling up, if you do put the wrong fuel in your car give me a call
Fuel price increase = misfuel increase
As if higher fuel prices were not bad enough…
I have notice a bit of a pattern over the last week, there was a higher than usual number of misfuels just before the big price hike, at the pumps, then it went very quiet for a couple of days – most people seemed to be avoiding the pumps.
Then Friday and today the phone has been ringing non-stop, lots of cases of people looking at the price before choosing a nozzle but since petrol is now as expensive as diesel used to be it is causing a muddle.
If you find you have misfueld at a pump do not start your engine and inform the garage, they will put a cone behind your car to stop people waiting behind you and they will normally be able to recommend a local company that can do a fuel drain, or you could call us on 07514409700 and if we are not in your area – we will know who is
Hopefully things will settle down over the next few days
AA & RAC Wrong fuel & Fuel Drain Service & Misfuelling Costs
Most people who fill up with the wrong fuel first turn to the AA & RAC.
It is widely thought that membership would cover fuel drains…….. dun dun dun dun!
Here’s some facts; the AA offers a mobile fuel draining service, called “fuel assist” The AA charge £209.34 for AA Members and £246.29 for non members as of January 2011, being the AA of course the work they do is of high standard, in some areas they can attend with a mobile fuel van, but this is not everywhere, if they cannot attend they may tow you home or to a garage that can perform a drain, you will have to pay the garage for this as the AA’s job ends when they get you there.
The RAC are fairly new to the fuel drain business and they are still in the pilot stages, therefore they don’t actually have fixed prices on there website, clients of mine have been qouted between 200 and 250. The RAC with the 6 vans they have operating out of the Bristol area or pass it on to approved and vetted fuel drain co’s, again technically the RAC also offer a good service and are a good company, along with the AA they are not the fastest to attend and they often price match the AA, they offer a £15 discount to members whereas the AA offers a £36 pound discount to members.
If you need a fuel drain, don’t take my word for it, call the RAC or the AA and see what they charge and how quick they can attend, then call me – you will get a better price and faster response.
I have been asked how I feel about the AA & RAC investing heavily into fuel drains and whether or not it will decrease my business, In fact I have seen it INCREASE my business, I’m faster, cheaper and answer my phone within 3 rings, I do the fuel drains myself and I know what my workload is, that way I can tell you exactly how long I will be. technically we use the same kit as the majors and we all do the same thing, but big companies sometimes cannot be as quick and nimble as the small local ones.
If you need a fuel drain, or have put petrol in diesel we are here 24 hours a day 7 days a week and we dont charge extra for weekends or nights,
call us for wrong fuel rectification
Petrol in Diesel Audi new filter
Petrol in a diesel on new years eve,
Did a fuel drain yesterday on a 5 year old diesel Audi A3, it had been fill’d to the top with petrol,
The client had attempted to do a DIY drain but it’s not an easy car to do so I got called in, he had bought a new fuel filter which I fitted,
Here is a picture of the new filter (white) next to the old filter (black)
I usually don’t change filters, it is more effective to flush them out than to change them but the client wanted this done – and in all fairness the old filter was a bit manky so it was worth doing.
As you can see the filter is just fins made from a hi tech paper, if a diesel filter gets contaminated with petrol it can be flushed through with clean diesel which takes out all the petrol, this is a tried and tested method and is far simpler than replacing a filter
Filters should be be changed according to the service manual, some new diesels can go 15k miles between services, by which time the filters can be very mucky, a dirty filter can put strain on the fuel pump and if they get really bad it can cause a gradual loss of power
If you are using bio-diesel or vegetable oil I would recommend a fuel filter change every 2 or 3 thousand miles, its a very simple job and the filters are generally accesible to make changing easy.