Thank you for your responses.. I was able to get to the brushes free, 3 of the four..

Then today I had had to roll over a small concrete lip 1" high (empty forks) and i thought going slow would help.. After about 5-10 seconds of trying i backed up and it sounded like i was playing with a bag of rocks... I immediately parked the forklift, lifted the front end by using blocks under the mast. turned the steering wheel so only one drive motor would work. I let the motor run for about 30-45 seconds so i could get a read with my stethoscope, in hopes to isolate where the sound was coming from. I had to stop because the motor started to smoke like crazy...

I am confident that i burned up my motor enough that I bought a brand new one , crown brand , from ebay for $825 delivered. arrives this coming week..... not bad considering today's insult.
But could the drive unit be toast as well? How could I test this? I have removed the drive motor... Are there instructions or drawings etc available?
thank
-jason