Damn, sorry to hear that dude. When my transmission was starting to sieze (for the second time) i also heard a "woodpecker" kinda sound shortly before my wheels locked and my motor would not turn over. There was nothing wrong with my motor, just major transaxle failure. Upon opening the tranny, I dicovered that my 4th gear sprocket had a huge chunk missing. So basically the chunk fell down into the transaxle causing it to sieze. I still don't know why my motor would not turn over until I repaced the tranny.