Skip to content

Cause

Reductant tank heater stuck on

The tank heater energised continuously rather than only below freezing. The heater exists because reductant freezes at around minus eleven degrees, and it should run only when needed.

Running permanently overheats the fluid, which degrades it: concentration drifts out of specification and the quality sensor eventually reports it. So a stuck heater produces a fluid quality fault, and replacing the fluid without fixing the heater degrades the new fluid too. A tank noticeably warm in mild weather is the physical sign. A welded relay is the commonest cause, and it is testable by substitution; a module driver failed short is the other, and both leave the circuit energised with the ignition off, which also drains the battery.

Typically a moderate job.

WhatsApp Telegram X Email

Codes this can cause (1)

Codes where this is a likely explanation first, rather than merely a possible one.

Information, not instruction

CarGeek is a reference, not a service manual. Its pages are written from public sources and from what other people have found, never from a manufacturer's own service information, so they can be wrong or incomplete for your particular vehicle. Some of what they describe carries real risk: high voltage, fuel under pressure, stored energy, hot and moving parts.

Have anything you intend to act on checked by a trained person against the manufacturer's own procedure for your vehicle. Nothing here replaces that procedure.

Others who found this

Be the first to write this up

Nothing posted about this yet. Whatever you found is worth writing down — even a dead end saves someone the same afternoon.

What makes one worth reading:

  • The car — make, model, year and engine. The same fault behaves differently on each.
  • What you measured, not only what you replaced.
  • What actually fixed it — or that nothing did, which is worth knowing too.

Sign in or create an account to add what you found about Reductant tank heater stuck on.