Lucky resolution!
Called the dealer about an hour before the free rental ends. As I expected, the tech was still studying the nonsense instruction for the recall. Told them to stop and give my car back. The "service advisor" had trouble understanding why I don't want it done, but just told her it's my car and I decide what to do with it. I can now proudly display the Ford form with "Customer declined recall at this time".
As has been mentioned, it beats me how Ford is saving money by having a tech lying on his back under the dash and cutting and splicing these wires for 1.3 hours rather than replacing the thing. Where I live labor is around $90/hour. Not to mention that the tech in my dealership spent three hours studying this nonsense and still hasn't even started the job -- or the cost of the rental they gave me.
I may take a look inside the LCM, but chances are there is nothing wrong with it, because my lights are on an external relay and don't load the LCM at all.

By the way: the Dodge that the rental place gave me had one of those little message centers in the middle of the instrument panel. Playing with it a bit, I found that it displayed coolant temp, trans fluid temp, engine oil temp, engine oil pressure, and total engine hours (in addition to the usual fuel economy, etc.) Very nice!!!

So it took their tech almost a full day to "study the instructions"? I'm not sure I would want him doing anything more complex than changing a light-bulb then...

Just get the guaranteed Ebay rebuild that no one has had problems with.

I put a junkyard unit in my car and haven't had problems since.

I think that the fact that they want to splice this crazyness in proves that their off-the-shelf replacements have the same problems as the original.

My God a car over 24 hours in service and was never touched. That's bad and wrong.

People, please be advised, for all civilian vics and the rest of the Panthers... I've read in other places that once this hack job is installed the autoheadlights on wipers feature stops working...
For the people that don't know what this is, it's a feature that when you select auto lights on the light switch, and then you turn on the wipers after 20 second of wipers operating the headlights turn on automatically. Well there's that, people who are getting this hack job seem to be losing this awesome feature.

Just sharing FYI

Aw, Crap! Never noticed. Thx for the info. Time to undo and get a new LCM.

Oh no! Can you confirm this? Have you tried it?

I love that "wiper-lights" feature... I just leave my headlight switch at "Auto" and they illuminate whenever it gets dark enough to require them for safety, if not to see where you're going; and the lights illuminate when the wipers are activated. "Lights on when wipers are on" is a law here in Illinois... but I don't know if it's a primary offense.

A couple days ago, I was driving at about dusk, when some douche was driving behind me in a Dodge Charger sedan with only his DRL's illuminated... the Dodge uses the high beam lamp at "less than full" brilliance... but it was bright enough to annoy me into pulling over and letting the SOB pass me. Since he was driving with DRL's, he had no tail lights either, of course.

I think a full-time "Auto-lamps" feature would be infinitely better than the DRL system currently in vogue in several areas.

My Marauder and my 2000 GMQ have this feature (obviously) and so did my 2001 GMC Safari work van. I really got to like not having to turn the headlights on and off manually no matter which vehicle I was in. Screw DRLs.

It's been confirmed that 3 people on mercurymarauder.net who have had this hack done have lost the headlights-on-with-wipers feature.

My LCM burned out my tail lights and marker lights on my 04 MM recently, it had a musclemmerc external headlight relay soldered to the board, so only the headlights were working. I had a spare LCM modified already so I put it in and was going to get the recall assuming a upgraded LCM was the fix... Thank god I checked here first NO THANKS. I will stick with the repaired LCM. And FYI if you loose your tail lights, it is probably the LCM, replacing it fixed my problem.

I dropped my car at the dealer to have this recall done tomorrow. I was hesitant, but I dont have the auto-on/wiper feature and dont have the downtime to get my LCM fixed.

Here's a video of it being performed, its not very complicated. I'd rather do it myself if given the parts.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUEJwmigHmQ

I'll take some pictures of the quality of work when I get it back.

My 03 GM has auto lamps that just seem to stay on all the time no matter how bright it is outside. They do go off when switched to off and seem to work normally otherwise--but it seems like the light sensor isn't working right.

Two questions.
1-Is this a side effect of this particular issue? It definitely seems to be an auto lamp issue but it's acting a little differently than most descriptions I've seen so far.
2-I just got the car and I don't know if this recall was ever performed. How can I check if it was?

Doesn't seem like it, in the case of the recall it is due to a faulty solder joint preventing a connection to the headlights. Flickering or intermittent lights could indicate a faulty connection, but lights that always work should surely have a good connection lol.

I think your ambient light sensor might have failed. When the sensor fails and you have the switch set to "Auto," it is a safety feature to keep the lights on as a failsafe.

Here is the replacement part: https://smile.amazon.com/Yf1z13a018aa-Sun-Load-Sensor-Ford/dp/B0042HJ9UE?sa-no-redirect=1

I had the recall performed back in 2017.

Yesterday I installed LED headlights, switch back LED bulbs and LED side marker lights in the front of my 03 CV LX. I decided to use the documentation provided with the instructions on the recall to also bypass the LCM internal turn signal relay. I added a three prong relay socket and plastic wire tied it to the LCM. I put an LED flasher module (CF14JL-02 flasher for LED 12V 0.02A-20A) in the socket.

I unplugged the three wire harnesses from the LCM. The largest of the wire harness plugs has a light blue wire which I cut and connected to the LED relay L(load) connection, a white with a red stripe wire which is cut and connected to the B+ relay connection. I added a ground wire to the relay B- connection to a chassis ground on the dash. I then plugged the three harnesses back into the LCM. I eliminated hyper flash and one more relay in the LCM.

Hello all,

I just want to share a link to where if anyone is interested in buying a new LCM motorcraft for so cheap. I've never seen them this cheap, they are even more cheap than the aftermarket. So yo anyone with plans of keeping their panther for a big while having an OEM LCM is a good idea.
The price is like 180 bucks if you return the old core.

https://www.rockauto.com/en/catalog/mercury,2003,grand+marquis,4.6l+v8,1410837,electrical,lighting+control+module+(lcm),10462