One problem related to front suspension control arm has been reported for the 1998 Mercury Grand Marquis. The most recently reported issues are listed below.
Autozone- valucraft brand- ball joints part number vfa2101 I recently had my ball joints replaced and I had a premature failure of the ball joint fastening hardware while driving down the city road in a straight line at 45 mph. It caused thousands of dollars of damage and it also almost cause me great injury. I suspect autozone is using low grade nuts cause the nut that was on the ball joint sheared off causing me to bend a control arm, crack my frame, blow a tire, all while barely missing a telephone pole. Had I been going down the highway at the posted speed limit I could have flipped my car, got pulled under a semi, cross the median into oncoming traffic and so on. I would like for an investigation to be started on their poor engineering choices and a recall to be started. Its just not for the safety of me but for the safety of other people. I do have all damage pictures and pictures of the failure point. I have pictures of the nut in question compared to another competitors brand and there is a noticeable size difference and hardness difference. The ball joints were replaced 9/26/2015 and failed on 4/25/2016. Autozone part number vfa2101. My belief is the nut is a lower grade when it should be a grade 8 nut. I say thousands of dollars because the auto body shops around me said they will not repair the frame because its a liability and would recommend a new frame to be put under the vehicle essentially totaling my car out causing me to have to spend thousands to replace my vehicle.