Hey folks – be great if I can get some help/advice from the forum with an adblue filling problem.
My GF has a 66 plate Q5 – she recently told me the adblue countdown message (which started at 1,000 mile to go) was saying 400 miles so I decided to do the refill assuming it was easy job ! Her records aren’t that good but we think it was last filled by her garage around Oct 2023 since which she’s done about 4,000 miles – of which quite a high %age are short journeys.
From the owners manual, various forums etc I think the tank is 23L capacity and it should have used around half a tank, so I got a couple 10L Greenchem containers. I’ve been fixing and mending me own vehicles for many years, mainly older cars but I’m happy to tackle major jobs, cambelts, suspension work, welding up etc and thought this would be routine task.
However when I tried to fill using the standard spout that comes with the containers about 1L went in and then it starts to overflow up out of the filler inlet hole and down thru’ the drain hole in the filler panel onto the drive. I tried inserting a thin tube to see if I could dipstick the adblue tank (and find out if there a non-return valve or other in the neck) – the tube went in ok (no valve I could feel) but the dipstick thing didn’t work (seeing the liquid was unclear). I then tried decanting the adblue into a smaller bottle and pouring it in (slowly) using the supplied spout as a funnel (it seemed like there could be an airlock problem with the 10L containers given there’s no air-admittance function) - but the same overflow thing happened and I couldn’t get anymore in.
After that I switched the ignition on & the 400 mile msg was still there – then it switched off and started and ran the car & the same msg still present.
I read the Q7 has a two tank system with one of the tanks being higher than the filler which has caused filling issues but no one says this is a Q5 problem. The manual refers to a “hose” to screw to the container (which defo looks longer than the supplied spout) but I’ve seen youtube vids of people happily filling a Q5 using exactly what I had – i.e. a 10L container with the supplied standard spout.
I guess the obvious problem is a failure of the warning system/sensor – but it has counted down the miles in a sensible fashion. Online info indicates 9,000 miles per 23L tank – so at 4,000 miles I was expecting the system to be around half full and thus to need about 10L ?
So frustrating that simple tasks are problematic on far too many modern cars…….
Thanks for any input
Cheers
Joolz