Ideas please with starter motor noise

[Pugsley]

I was unsure whether this really belonged in the electrical section but it's more of a mechanical noise.

Today I put the gearbox back in to my 410 after fitting new bearings and seals - no real problems but quite difficult to jack up the gearbox to the correct height and angle on my own but I managed. When I removed the starter motor I just let it sit in the engine compartment and having fitted it back in it now has a very piercing "Shriek" when I start the engine. It didn't do it before and both the pinion and flywheel teeth are in good condition.

The engine starts almost immediately with no sign of teeth slippage or poor engagement. Not that I thought it would do anything but I removed the two securing bolts and withdrew the starter and then put it back in - but still the same.

Do you think I've done something to create this or is it just a coincidence? An afterthought is that it could be a bearing in the motor in which case is it possible to buy an overhaul kit to include the bearings and pinion gear?

[Edweird]

Did it just do it once or does it do it every time?

[Pugsley]

It now appears to be a coincidence. I removed the starter motor today and operated it on the bench - very lethargic and non-operational. I stripped it down to find it was full of back crud and dry of any lubrication. After a good brush down in petrol I could see that it was really in quite good order so with a sparing smear of high temp grease on the working parts, a polish of the armature and terminals (brushes were in good condition) and reassembly, it now works brilliantly.

I think perhaps that because I put the battery on charge whilst putting the gearbox in, the starter motor was getting more umph than normal and because of its dry and dirty state the mechanism was under stress.

I'm now getting quite used to the fact that if you change for example a headlight bulb it's likely that the water pump will fail!!

[ScottieJ]

You didn't forget the thin spacer plate between the engine and gearbox did you?

[Pugsley]

You didn't forget the thin spacer plate between the engine and gearbox did you?

Good thought but no I didn't - it now appears to be working okay, it's better than before it went funny on me.