Ugh!
Thought I would finally get around to servicing my brakes today. Thought total cost would be $137 for the eight new pads I already bought from the dealer parts department plus $60 to $75 for turning rotors, and that the biggest time investment would be removing and cleaning the calipers and brakes, plus of course visiting the machine shop.
(yupnope)
Turned out the front rotors are permanently fused to the hubs. As in, laying the assembled spindles on the driveway and bashing with a 8# hammer accomplishes nothing. Living in Michigan, I thought I'd seen rusted rotors before on our old Cavalier, but those always came off with some Liquid Wrench and a deadblow mallet.
In addtion, it turns out changing hubs apparently requires a bearing press. Also turns out hub kits are $185 *each* at NAPA (where my local machine shop is located), though of course it's possible to go cheaper. Also learned that it takes a little attention to get a kit that also includes a bearing, a snap ring, and an axle nut. Actually found a pretty good deal at RockAuto, but I'm not keen on waiting till next Tuesday for my parts!
Sooooooo, now my entire spindles are in the trunk of the other car, waiting to go parts shopping tomorrow morning. I did find that a couple of local auto wreckers supposedly have good used hubs, and if they're still on spindles that could make this little job both easier and cheaper. Wreckers close at 5pm, so I'll call/visit tomorrow morning.
Oddly, Alldatadiy seems to contain mainly diagrams and torque specs. I wasn't able to locate step by step instructions like I was used to in the cheapie Haynes manuals I always had for all our cars in the past. Funky, and a bit disappointing.