I feel for you. The worst thing is to not feel part of the process when it's your own body that's under discussion!
About the length of surgery: first off - when surgeons say "it's going to take me about an hour" he means it's going to take HIM about an hour! Surgeons NEVER include time for being checked into the OR, the anaesthetist checks and preparation, actually giving the anaesthetic - which can take up to ¾ an hour for a general or 1½ hrs for a spinal - positioning the patient on the table and draping up, removing drapes and cleaning, reversing the anaesthetic plus anything up to 2 hours in recovery.
I can understand your family's anxiety. My sister went through much the same when her son had major surgery for cancerous glands in his neck. Such patients commonly spend 2-3 hours in recovery but the surgeon had told her the op would take 3 hrs. He went down at 1.30pm so as soon as 4.30 came and he wasn't back in the ward, major panic set in! All was well, of course, but it caused her no-end of stress.
Secondly, I would suggest that your surgeon was being overly optimistic in saying it would take him 1½ hrs. I can't ever remember a revision that took less that 2 hrs. The average was 3 hrs as a minimum, most took 4hrs+. In other words, they were always marathons and any experienced scrub nurse would make double sure they'd had a bite to eat, a drink and a visit to the loo before they scrubbed up!
And I totally agree with your comment about the prostheses though it wouldn't be apparent in a xray - you actually can't tell much except the outline from an xray - but the age factor should have been enough to tell him the way to go. In fact, in these situations, I always put in my two penn'orth about such things and often the surgeons would come to theatre to discuss them with me as well.
Had one case where a patient had a VERY old plate in his hip that was implanted about 40 years before and required a dedicated instrument to remove it. It took me about a month to track down the original manufacturer and for them to find the instrument in their museum! But we got it and as a result the op went off with no problems.
In your case, I would have recommended that the surgeon ditch the idea of trying to use only new inserts from the get-go as it would be so impractical and the chances of there being a delayed failure would be very real. So I think you got the best in that situation,
Digging out tiny bits of cement from the femoral shaft is always a protracted, frustrating and exhausting process. There are special long thin instruments for this but they are difficult to use as it's a bit like trying to see down a narrow drain pipe whilst manipulating the instrument at the same time.
In the end it is, as you are finding, that he is just a very poor communicator. I hope you get answers when you see him next.