wheel problem

[Swifty Stig]

Evening all
Just encountered a bit of a problem when cleaning the car.
Nearly all of the wheel balancing weights have just fallen off in my hand when cleaning the alloys. The car is 3 years old and i was wondering if this is common on a car of such age?
I must also add that i used an alloy cleaner and never really noticed the state of the weights untill they popped off. Fairly rusty and stuck on with sticky pad-ish stuff - with no known history of having to be changed before.
How much roughly would i be for each wheel to be done, and would anything else be required?
Ive googled and as usual nothing of relevance pops up.
Sorry in advance if in wrong section. just hoping for a quick couple of answers

Thanx
Swifty

[carmonk]

It's common for them to degrade but if they've just come off then it indicates either you've been powerwashing your wheels with gay abandon or the fitters didn't bother degreasing the inner circumference when the balances were initially put on. When you get them balanced again make sure they remove the crap from the place where they intend to fit the weights. Or, maybe best to do it yourself before you take it in.

[Swifty Stig]

Thanks monk "Gay Abandon" haha great term! Yeah i was quite merrily hosing the crap off to be honest. Easy done i suppose. Took it upto 60 on the bypass just now quite gently at intervals of 10 and i never noticed anything different in the way the car behaved. (reading too much wheel wobble stories) Car wont be used for a few days anywho so it can just sit sparkling away to itself in the drive Ill get it booked into garage on day off next week. Fingers crossed it doesnt cost too much haha

swifty