Yeah, I was pleased to extract it without (apparently) damaging anything. Little surprise that a pin on the other side (they were both lower) was seized as well; this one far easier to free, though. That explains why the car didn't pull, methinks. My use of heat was a token effort before giving up, and I believe I didn't use enough to damage or alter anything. Visually, the pin was not bent. Good tip on mic-ing them to check for wear - an idea that hadn't occurred to me. By the time I read your message, all was reassembled. I did flush the bore with soapy water, then brake clean and dried with compressed air. The brush on a drill idea is brilliant. I didn't have a suitable brush on hand. I wiped them out with an alcohol soaked cotton swab, though. I also swapped them left to right per your suggestion--seems like a good idea, while also satisfying my obsessive compulsive (dis)order.

The body of my car is pleasantly rust free, at least for a New England car. However, everything around the brake area is pretty rusty. Bad enough that I observed water leaking out the opposite end of one of the driver's side caliper bracket while cleaning. As I'm strapped for time presently; scrambling to get things done before my kids are off school for the summer, and I have even less time. Come fall, I plan to take the car off the road for a few weeks, and address everything properly. In the short term, though, I'm going back in to replace all the pin boots and brake pads (more on that in a bit). I should find where the water is leaking, and plug with JB Weld, although a replacement should really be done, I suppose. Now that I'm thinking about it, maybe I'll buy some clean take-off calipers with brackets, rebuild them off the car (which I can do in the evening after kids are in bed), and make a quick job of it with regards to time spent on the car. I also have to replace all four dust shields. I'll leave that until this fall.

Oh yeah, I have two of those Lucas kits in my cart. Not to rub it in, but they are down to $1.09 at the moment. I don't want to hoard, but... I'll place the order today, once I'm sure of the pads.

Now about the brake pads: I used the ones which came with the rotors, and only once I had the wheels back on, I noticed the swept area of the pads doesn't match the rotors. Specifically, the pads don't cover the friction part of the rotor all the way across at the hub end. There's at least 1/8" that's not covered. The backing plates match what came off, but the curve on the hub end (bottom?) is exaggerated compared to the old ones. I haven't bother to bed them in, because I'll obviously get a better fitting set.

Hold up, a minute: why the heck would I "use the pads that came with the rotors?" Or even buy them that way in the first place? Well, the fashion bug bit me when I saw an absolutely ridiculous price on R1 Concepts drilled, slotted and coated, complete with pads (mis-priced--they went up four-fold--cheaper than cheap basic rotors). I never intended to use the pads, but when the rears started to squeal (not metal on metal, but getting there), I just did them when I found a free moment, not having bothered to select and buy my choice of pads. I was quite surprised to find that the included pads worked really well on the rears, so decided to try them up front. Well I should have matched them up better. Lesson learned.

Anyway, I'm tempted to try ceramics again. For years I swore by Akebonos, as I don't clean my car often. Sure, the initial bite isn't as good as organics or semi-metallics, but you get used to it. With this car not having the best initial bite to begin with, I felt I should go back to a grippier compound. But I also have a set of white painted Satellites (again, fashion), and might get tired of the dust. I see Rock Auto has Brembo Ceramics (didn't even know they did pads) for less than Akebono. I might give those a try. Considering my pins were seized, I figure they'll feel at least as good as the semi-metallics I was fine with before.

Anyone with thoughts on Brembo pads (or different compounds on these cars generally), feel free to weigh in. I see there's some discussion on this right now in Kitty's thread. I'm inclined to agree one can't go wrong with OE Volvo. Except now I'm posing as one of the cool kids, and I want to minimize the dust. I've never regretted going with ceramics on previous vehicles.

-Wilson