I now realized that the ball joint on the LCA isn’t strong on Mazda vehicles. My LCA was bent at ball joint location, and the ball joint itself had also become loose in the socket with torn rubber boot after the hard impact to the curb. And it’s been reported several times here where the ball joint comes out of the socket which created very dangerous driving situation even on an almost new CX-50:
CX-5 Suspension control arm failure
Control Arm Shears off on a 2023 CX-50 with 2k miles
I was surprised by these relatively early LCA bushing / ball joint、tie rod ends、and stabilizer bar link / bushing failures on the CX-5. My 1998 Honda CR-V EX AWD with 191,976 miles still has original front suspension on every components. I only replaced all rubber boots and rack & pinion bellows as the ball joints、tie rod ends、stabilizer bar links themselves are still pretty tight. The front and rear struts were replaced but honestly the original struts at the time were still not in any bad shape and required the replacement.
Yes rust will always be the major obstacle for the suspension job especially for DIYers. Luckily my current vehicles haven’t suffered this problem. Glad you have done the most front suspension job by yourself which saved some money for you, and you don’t have to deal with it for the next 10 years ⋯