I clearly need to get an early night tonight. Petrol station, not thinking started trying to get the PETROL nozzle into my DIESEL Octavia VRS. I knew full well that there was a mechanism on the car to stop you putting petrol in as I have had that conversation before with my better half. Anyway, for whatever reason that did not come to the forefront of my mind whilst I was trying to get the petrol nozzle into the car to little avail. A car pulled up being me waiting to fill up to so I got a bit flustered, I assumed the nozzle was not going in properly as I was parked a bit away from the pump itself. I pressed the trigger and soon realised the error or my ways after the petrol came spitting back at me. The figures I put in are shown on the screenshot. The fuel tank was just above the red line on the gauge before I put that bit of petrol in. I then put enough diesel in to get me home (40 mile journey ish from that point). When I got back and read a few other stories about people who had done similar to me, I went to my local garage and filled the tank up with more diesel.

Have I got away with it or should I take some further action ?

Although the petrol nozzle won't actually fit, I notice that there are holes (lines) around the enterance of the fuel hole so is it likely some petrol got into the tank through these holes (lines)

Cheers

I don't know if the picture I attached to the original post worked so here it is again.

Cheers.

Not having much luck with the picture of my fuel reciept but it basically showed :-

0.13 litres of unleaded

19.48 litres of Diesel

Cheers

Petrol is a natural solvent, diesel is a natural lubricant. The inner workings of the CR pump reply on the lubricating properties of diesel. If NEAT petrol runs through it, it strips the lubrication and usually lunches the pump, then damages the injectors. 

 

I think you have been lucky with the minuscule amount of petrol that got in. My advice would be get as much diesel in that car as you can to dilute that petrol right down. 

 

If your fuel level was just above the red, it's safe to assume there was at least a gallon in the tank before the petrol went in, so lets say 6 litres. That equates to around 2% petrol in the tank, not including what diesel you put in afterwards which would drop that to around 0.5% petrol. 

Edited 20 January, 201610 yr by dstev2000

Sounds like bugger all to be worried about myself

It's a lease car.

 

It is also under warranty.

 

If in the unlikely event of future issues play innocent.

Or blame the other half! 

I don't know about modern cars but I put about £8 of petrol in my wifes 106 van many years ago... When I realised I stopped and brimmed the tank with diesel which was probably another £35 or so and it ran fine but that was old school with mecahnical injection and normally aspirated, don't think I'd chance that much with a modern car but in your case the ratio of petrol to diesel is so low I wouldn't be that concerned

I've done it in the past where I put about ½ gallon into a diesel, then topped it right to the brim, but that was deliberate as it was extremely cold, so it helped keep the diesel fluid.

My wife did exactly the same, albeit the petrol/diesel ratio was slightly worse than yours.

We just filled with diesel and kept refilling as soon as we used a few litres.

All was fine.

Good luck to you.

Common rail cars with HPFP's are alot more sensitive to petrol contamination, as others have said petrol is effectively a solvent so has the capacity to completely lunch a modern CR motor (well certainly the injection system) if added in any great quantity, small amounts are however unlikely to cause a major problem....particularly if its been heavily diluted.

I stuck a load of petrol in a diesel Astra once upon a time...I think that may have beeen a 2.0 DTi and not a CDTi however....advice from the recovery company was that I should not turn on the ignition as even priming the fuel system can cause an issue....which unfortunately I had. However, once recovered, the fuel extracted, decontaminated and filled with diesel it ran perfectly and I dont think ever had a problem from that point on (was a heavily used pool car).

I thought however that the Octavia has midfeed prevention, that should stop you being able to get a petrol pump in a diesel or is that not correct?

Don't be too hard on yourself - us guys have a lot on our minds/to deal with so honest mistake.

 

However, if the opposite sex did it...

This reminds me of a friend of mine who topped the oil up on her Micra when we were at 6th form, she literally topped it up to the top of the filler cap. The smoke was reminiscence of top of the pops lol

Thanks for the replies all.

The car does has misfuel prevention :-

Misfuelling prevention

If you’ve ever absent-mindedly used the petrol rather than diesel pump, or the other way round, you’re in good company. Because every year motorists right across Europe make the same error. Now ŠKODA drivers will never need worry about making the same mistake.

We’ve designed the car’s fuel tank access port so it only fits the appropriate pump nozzle. Try pumping petrol into a diesel ŠKODA and you won’t be able to. Simply Clever, isn’t it? It’s just one more sensible, everyday reason you know you’ve made the right choice when you select ŠKODA.

As I say though, a lot of the petrol did seem to just splash back off the misfuel prevention mechanism thing, but the thing that concerned me was that it seems to have holes (lines) round the sides which look like any type of fluid can seep through. I may be wrong though. If those holes do not lead to the fuel tank then I may have got away with it completely.

Does anyone know if the holes do allow fluid straight through to the fuel tank ? It seems silly to have them holes there in the first place if not, but I am sure there is a plausible reason that they are there.

130ml in a full tank won't be an issue.

I've drunk more than 130ml of petrol myself when times were hard, it'll be fine.

 

Regards

T

Was once driving from Barnsley to Prague and one of my co-drivers put 15litres of petrol in my diesel Zafira. 3am in Belgium, so the options were wait for recovery and get it drained or top up with diesel and hope for the best. Noticed a small drop in performance, but no real ill-effect, when fuel level dropped to a quarter tank, we just filled to brim with diesel and continued. Ran the car for a further 12 months after that incident and no issues. 

As said, that tiny amount of petrol won't do anything.

 

If you brim your tank with petrol and start the car, the damage will be done. Even if it goes again after flushing out the petrol, chances are you've damaged a lot of very expensive components that will wear a lot faster now they've had a solvent rather than lubricant running through them.

 

Edited 22 January, 201610 yr by softscoop

I've drunk more than 130ml of petrol myself when times were hard, it'll be fine.

 

Regards

T

 

Haha, same here, you aren't a proper petrol head until you've had a mouthful of petrol when not being quick enough during syphoning