While easily replacement lower ball joints would be awfully nice, it's most definately not cost effective, if the arm would cost +/- $500 or so. Y'all aren't thinking overall cost, you're thinking maintenence cost.
I won't debate the estimate of how much LCA's would cost; SoCal covered it pretty well already, and his numbers seem really reasonable.
So if you're thinking a $500 set of LCA's would be cost effective, just to get a replacement lower ball joint, you're nuts! If you replace LCA's every 50,000 miles or so (which is reasonable if you beat on your LCA's severely; if not, then it'll take a good bit longer before replacing), you'd have to go over 150,000 miles before recouping that initial $500 cost.
And sure, an easily replaceable lower ball joint sure would be nice, the lower ball joints are ALREADY replaceable. You just can't buy them new. You have to buy used ones, then replace 'em. Which is annoying, 'cause you're getting somebody else's garbage.
What we really need, is an aftermarket ball joint. It's a weird design, but somebody's making the things. Either that, or we need a retrofit kit, to retrofit a D21 chasis lower ball joint into the D22 lower control arm. Something like that at around $100 or so a pop would be well worth it.
The strength issues on the LCA are few and far between. So the shock mount tears out... Re-weld it, and be on your way. That's not worth $500! About the only damage I've seen to a LCA, that really is a problem, is the pic I've seen w/ the LCA torn/ripped at the ball joint. So whatever caused that damage, yeah, a strong LCA would be helpful.
But I've only seen 1 LCA do that. Anybody else? 1 in hundreds of thousands X's and Frontiers on the road doesn't sound like that big/widespread of a problem to me.
Y'all aren't thinking about the big picture. It's not cost effective to spend a fortune on a bullet proof LCA, just to get an easily replaceable ball joint. It's just not worth it.
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