Rather than going for a complex fix, that might require a lot of effort, you might want to try simpler solutions first
You said it spins then ticks and then its done for, right? Well, sounds to me the disc was thrown off balance or there is dust particles in it. For real, I'm being serious.
Before you do anything, tap it with slight pressure a couple of times on each side and swallow all your spit (to ensure you do not make it worse by spitting on it) and gently blow on it. It sounds odd but I have brought back several things from the grave, and one of Apples documented ways of fixing " hitting it hard on the back right side", so its not unprecedented
If it still doesn't work connect it to your computer as a secondary / storage drive and boot into your os that you have on another drive (not the broken one) and in sessions copy your data off the broken disk. Doing it this way improves the chance of a successful data extraction as the drive does not take as much power nor spins as fast. Avoid xcopy and robocopy or equivalent as that will spin your disk harder than you want, and try to go into the disk then using right-click copy/paste or its equivalent instead.
Your way though, honestly, with consideration to money, time, and labor, you ought just get a ssd instead... But just try what I am saying because it is already busted so if I am wrong you are out nothing if i am right!
I'd disagree with getting an SSD as a solution, and the other things seem somewhat plausible, though i'd suggest them as a last resort. I've heard of freezing as another last resort method, but your mileage may vary on this – Journeyman Geek – 2012-06-04T10:53:01.647