Wrong fuelling is a serious issue in any case but on the bases of the engine technology it becomes more serious luckily, adding diesel in petrol is comparatively a less worst error as compared to adding petrol in a diesel car. Adding petrol in a diesel car is also easy because of the nozzle size. The nozzle of the petrol is smaller than the nozzle of the diesel pumping machines at fuel stations.
Both diesel engines and petrol engines work on a totally different principle and every part used in these engines is designed to follow a specific methodology and they fulfil the requirements to achieve the specific results. Such as diesel engines work on the compression system and mix the air with fuel to blast it by compressing it to an extreme level and get the working cycle.
Diesel burns at a very high compression rate and produces a powerful punch too. Diesel engines this way generate more torque at a lower horsepower. Petrol engines, on the other hand, work differently, they use ignition to blast the mixture of the fuel and air, no compression involves like in the diesel engines.
Thus adding diesel in petrol can significantly reduce the power delivery. Putting diesel in petrol engines is relatively foolproof but people are so intelligent these days, they still add diesel in petrol. There are a few reasons why adding diesel in petrol is difficult, the first and larger most reason is the nozzle size of diesel fuel.
Diesel fuel has a physically larger nozzle which is impossible to fit into the petrol tank’s neck. Petrol filler necks are designed to make the diesel in petrol error less common. However, the consequences of putting diesel in the petrol engines are not as bad as if you put petrol in a diesel car.
Indeed yes, wrong fuelling in any way is a real pain, it causes you to get off the road, long waits for the recovery services, hefty repair bills and pain. But all in all, putting diesel in petrol is less painful and it doesn’t cause any serious damage as petrol does in the diesel engines.
Petrol can ruin the vital components of a diesel engine while on the other hand, diesel in petrol only results bad or no combustion due to its density and viscosity. Diesel is generally called heavy fuel. As it is more viscous and nonvolatile to ignition, unlike petrol.
Petrol is extremely volatile to any type of ignition and can catch fire. Although in both engines, air and fuel mixture is the same but diesel requires high compression level to burn while petrol requires ignition.
Using diesel in petrol will not start the engine combustion process as it is not a normal fuel for any petrol engine. If it starts somehow, it won’t be able to achieve the required speed, it will significantly lose the power and will rotate at dead slow speed. There would not be any significant power available to drive the vehicle.
The damage rate to the engine components will be very small or even below to zero but the effects on performance will be significant.
It is not a big deal to put diesel in petrol, this will only affect the combustion process. Keep in mind that the diesel has a higher density and it will not mix in petrol that easy, so cleaning the fuel tank would be enough to return to the door.
The diesel in petrol is bad but it’s not something that you have done out of the world, there are four drivers every hour in the UK make the same error. Fixing the issue will involve a few less expensive steps.
At the first step, shut your engine down and call the wrong fuel assist recovery. Secondly, flush the fuel tank and fuel system and fill it with petrol and re-initialize the system. You are OK to get back to the road with the same power and efficiency.
