4AGZE Starter Motor???

[Duk]

I've just completed the Fuel pump, Timing belt/water pump repares to my AW11 MR2, and while bleeding the coolant system, I gave the throttle a bit of a flick to try and get the idle down a little (had the accel cable disconnected in a vane attempt to get to some hoses, yada yada).

After flicking the throttle, there was a howling crunching noise and a need for fresh jocks

1st thaughts were that something harder than air had gotten into the engine and muched the supercharger. So I loosened the SC belt and spun it a few times. Perfect!
I then double checked cam timing. Perfect.
I also turned the engine over by hand (rachet, extension and socket on the crank pulley bolt). Perfect.
So I thought I'd start the engine and see what happened........ Not much. The starter would clunk, half turn the engine and that's it.
The battery had sat on the charger for a day and a half while the car was idle and it cranked the engine over without a hitch initially.
So rather than thinking something unpleasant has happened to my engine, I'm thinking the starter motor decided to engage partly in the ring gear and is now, for some reason, dead.
Also, when I was lining up cam timing marks, there was some noise coming from the back of the engine/starter motor area. Nothing major but deffinate clang/clunk gear teathy sort of noise.
Has anybody heard of or experianced this sort of thing?

[Duk]

I forgot how easy it is to take the starter motor out of the MR2 when it's over the pit.
Is this going to be a problem?
Are the other 4A starter motors the same?

[legend]

i have a 4age bigport and that starter wouldn't work when i changed over to 4agze with the lsd gearbox
best bet just get a s/h one and use yours for parts or u could try a smallport 4age starter i think the difference with the 4agze one is it is at the back of the motor

[Duk]

Thought I'd add that a 20v starter motor does the job, even if it is a slightly different design but probably wouldn't allow the supercharger to be removed without first removing the starter motor.