carb was leaking, fixed that, it was just a smashed o ring, no big deal, go to start it up FINALLY, turn the key, starter makes a wirring noise, but won't spin the motor... any ideas? i'm figuring it needs replacing... but any ideas are welcome

 

a whirring noise? Recently I had problems with my starter as well. The whirring sound you might be talking about could be the hot start assist or I think at least thats what it is, im talking about on the drivers side strut tower... Ummm what I would do is pull the starter, test it out see if it works, you most likely should just replace the whole thing.

 

i don't have any of that stuff hooked up at all... its most definately coming from my starter, its pretty loud, and pretty obvious where its coming from... i'm running a very minimalistic setup

 

It sounds like your solenoid. Take it to westbay and have it load tested.

 

when I was in the same situation I tested the starter, hooked it up to direct power out of the car, I learned that a whole new starter was only a small amount more then just the selenoid...