Bad Fuel?

[reubsrover]

A friend owning a MY93 Discovery V8 has an issue. Last nighthe was driving to pick a friend up after the local servo was closed so hegrabbed 15l of fuel from work. Not far down the road the Disco started coughing,backfiring and losing power, he limped about 15km back home like this at about40km/hr and borrowed my car.

The fuel from work may have been contaminated with diesel aswe use a diesel petrol mix for controlled burns.

Do the symptoms fit a contamination with diesel?

What damage is likely to have occurred?

Is there an easy way to drain the tank of a Disco?

Thanks in advance for your help.

[fonfe]

Drain the tank, wash it out with fresh fuel and drain again then fill it right up and pop some injector cleaner in there.
Because there is a chance he's used contaminated fuel and it happened right after putting in suspect fuel and the symptoms I'd say that's probably the most likely cause.
Remove the plugs and clean them (NOT with a wire brush) they are probably dirty as hell now. If they are bad just put new ones in.

On the td5s there is an inspection hatch underneath the rear boot carpet, not sure if the v8 vehicles have the same but worth having a look. Otherwise I'd pull off a fuel line and suck the fuel out then flush with several litres of petrol.
Most of the time you can get away without doing any real damage, its when you put petrol into a diesel than you cause expensive problems.

[reubsrover]

Thanks for the help, turns out it was likely caused by letting the fuel get too low and some dirt was probably picked up. Ran fine a day later so I told him to change his fuel filter.