The AA and BIBA (British Insurance Brokers Association) have both claimed that there are in excess of 150,000 misfuelling incidents each year where motorists with a momentary lapse of concentration mistakenly put petrol into the tanks of their diesel cars.
The cost of an individual misfuelling event can range from £ 300 for a simple fuel drain and refill to more than £ 5,000 if the car is driven any distance and a new engine is required. The car rental comparison site, carentals.co.uk, estimated that the total cost of misfuelling in the UK reaches £ 800million each year.
The growth in fuel drain services is testament to the scale of the problem. Both the AA and RAC have their own dedicated fleets of fuel drain engineers; Nationwide / Halfords Autocentres have announced 200+ repair locations across the UK; beyond that there is an army of smaller fuel drain businesses cropping up almost daily. The problem here is that once a vehicle has been misfuelled lasting damage may have already occurred.
Intriguingly, misfuelling is almost entirely avoidable. A number of car manufacturers have started to fit misfuelling prevention devices to their vehicles at the factory, which is progress. However, the lead times between development and integration mean that more widespread manufacturer led prevention devices are still several years away.
Prevention is Better than Cure
There are a five or six retrofit misfuelling prevention devices available which work in a number of different ways. Some provide an audible warning that the vehicle uses diesel; another requires a two-handed operation, one to test the nozzle size, the other to remove the cap; the remainder work on the basis that only a nozzle the exact size of a diesel pump nozzle can be inserted.
One of the major issues with the retrofit market is that not all of these products have been properly tested by the independent vehicle testing agencies like MIRA and Thatcham and not all of them have valid VCA certificates. As a result individuals who use the untested and formally accredited products run several risks that may not be initially apparent. These products are fitted into the fuel tanks of cars and vans; as such fitting one without the necessary testing certificates is likely to invalidate insurance policies and may significantly increase safety risks.
Tests constructed by Thatcham and MIRA to ensure misfuelling devices are fit for purpose include:
- Rollover tests, which ensure that if a car rolls over, there is only a limited release of fuel. A fuel filler cap requires a breather to avoid vacuums in the tank so there is a fine balance required here;
- Flow tests to ensure that fuel flow from the pump is not inhibited;
- Blowback tests make sure that you don't end up with diesel on you or your clothes instead of it going into the tank;
- Insertion tests – a nozzle is inserted and withdrawn over 5,000 times designed to provide assurance that the device will not break or wear out;
- Electrostatic discharge – use of proper, more expensive materials, helps to dissipate any potential electrostatic build up. Failure to deal with this can lead to exploding fuel tanks, a problem BMW identified when the new Mini One was released.
Fitting aftermarket caps to your fuel tank should not be a decision taken without proper research. There is one stand-out retrofit misfuelling prevention device that has passed all of the above tests by MIRA and received the coveted Thatcham Accreditation as well as a VCA Certificate – the Diesel Key. No other product has proven its ability to meet these stringent test criteria. The Diesel Key is quick and easy to fit and has been designed to fit 90% of modern diesel vehicles giving the user the necessary safety assurances in the process. This is why the Diesel Key is fast becoming the misfuelling prevention device of choice by fleet managers and the UK emergency services.
