I had to replace my flywheel because of missing/bad teeth in the fall....not a pretty sound I can tell you that. It grinds like you would not believe.As for the possibility of the drive gear not going out to engage the flywheel, it is a possibility due to the cold weather we have been having latley. Moisture can also play a part in that as well, especially if it got really wet and then froze. But you made a comment about starting the car without pushing in the cluth. I thought the clutch had to be pushed in (safety switch)?I feel for you if you have to change the starter in -20C weather. Been there....done that too many times (once is one time too many, but it was more than once).
But trouble lurked in the bottom end: we found a trashed thrust bearing surface that the clutch release rod would load when the clutch pedal was depressed. The thrust bearing was the one-piece style integrated main/thrust that Dr. Diesel reported similar bad luck with. At .033" axial play (about twice the wear limit,) all the soft metal had already been worn through and it was already starting to gaul the smooth thrust surface on the crank, but dealing with that was much more of an undertaking than we wanted at the moment, so we just put it back together with a fresh thrust bearing (unfortunately, the only style we could find quickly locally was the one-piece), and will keep our fingers crossed it will last for at least a little while.