I was swapping out my brake pads last night and had to improvise. This really isn't a problem as I can (and did by removing the whole mechanism from the rotor)work around it, but I'm stumped as to what happend.....

On the front-driver-side caliper, the top bolt came off immediately, but the lower one was a bitch to loosen, seriously took me 20 minutes to get it loose, but once I did, all the threading came out but then it (the bolt) wouldn't budge so I couldn't get the caliper off. I was hitting the damn thing with a hammer, wrench, etc and it woudln't budge (trust me, i was doing this in the right way, i can understand why you'd think that sounds bad). It can't be warped as a) no reason b) it fits snugly in the housing. The other one on the same caliper came off perfectly, and on the passenger side both were fine. the pads had been burning evenly .... i'm stumped as to why i couldn't get that damn bolt out!

 

I had the what seems like the same thing happen happen to me. Pads wore evenly on both sides and when I went to replace the pads the bottom bolt wouldn't come out. I eventually broke it and found out that it had welded itself inside somehow or something else happend because it broke off right at the threads. So I too a trip to Autozone they sell that bracket with new bolts for $35 dollars all lubed up and ready to go if you end up needing to replace it.