Bit of background to better help someone help me... Thank you in advance!
About 3 months ago I hit a deer in my 2005 GT and did some damage to the front drivers side of it... the car was still running after the collision, i pulled over to the side of the highway, got out and checked the damage, then got back in and turned the car off to call CAA (im in Canada, its our version of AAA). Called insurance the next day and they said I wasn't covered. So the cars been sitting in my driveway under a cover while I collected some money to fix it. Yesterday, I went to go start it to move it into a better spot to tow it to a body shop and found out theres more issues than just some body work.
THE PROBLEM:
When I turn the key instead of the normal sound of the engine trying to turn over it makes an awful screeching noise. It sounds like the starter is grinding against the flywheel except all of my belts are moving. I haven't tried much for fear of damaging anything more. I charged the battery to make sure it was getting enough power and then connected it to my winter car and used that as my power source with no success. Nothing seems to be in the way of any moving parts in the engine. I will post some pictures of the damage. *WARNING* images may be upsetting to car lovers lol. Any help is greatly appreciated.
Ryan

 

 

There might be physical damage you haven't noticed like a piece of debris damaging the starter or oil pan as an example. I would check oil levels. If oil levels are good, try to turn engine by the crank bolt to isolate the noise. If oil levels are bad, perhaps you have a leak in your oil system somewhere.

 

What type of FE damage - your oil cooler is located on the lower L (and R) of the FE? Pictures of external and engine bay?

 

oh i forgot to mention that i checked the fluids and the levels were all full (except the coolant resevoir, its cracked... rad is fine tho). The oil looked fine, i changed it about 800km ago and it was a light brown. I will try to hand crank it tho! Thank you

 

I added pictures to the thread, sorry those are the best i have right now, im not currently with the car so i cant go take extras at the moment.

 

Unplug the air pump plug on the top of the passenger side shock tower ( big red one)

See if the noise goes away.............

 

Oil cooler looks surprisingly untouched. Which is nice.

 

To me it sounds like one of your pulleys is seized. Take your serpentine belts off and see if any of the pulleys (alternator, etc) are sticking (just spin them by hand, they should all spin freely). This sounds EXACTLY what I recently went through with our Evo. (it happened after we let it sit for a bit while slowly making a repair... horrid screeching, refusal to start with both a new battery and a new starter... alternator pulley completely seized). You probably already had a failing pulley bearing, but it wasnt bad enough that it was symptomatic.. but once they sit for a bit they tend to want to seize up.

 

BTW - is there any lubrication that is normally done to pulleys?

 

If that were my car and I decided on a body shop to do the work, I wouldn't take any chances; I'd have it towed there.