Re-formatting iMac's Corrupted Hard drive..Suggestions please

Because of a failed Optimisation I feel I now have to completely wipe, re-format and re-load OSX onto my iMac's internal HD, but never having done this before I want to make sure I don't end up in more of a mess then I am in right now! So I'd appreciate any advice as to the best way to go about this.
My iMac is a late 2009 27" and at present has OSX 10.8.5 loaded, ( loaded but with many miss-functions ). Prior to the problem the iMac was running OSX Lion, what version though I can't remember.I installed 10.8.5 the other day to see if that would fix things, but it hasn't. It was not a "clean install", just regular one from downloaded OSX 10.8.5.
I have run Disk Utility and TechTool Pro' 7 to try to make repairs to address the problems so far to no avail. Main problems are that my most used applications, FCP-7 Studio, Aperture and Photoshop CS5 amongst others, open but then immediately crash. I've reloaded the troubled applications, de-installed them properly with de-installation app's then clean re-installed them, but that's made no difference. They will not mount.
I reckon there must be a fault or corruption on the HD, probably caused during the Optimisation as everything was functioning well before I did that.
So, the only OSX install disks I have are the original disks that came with the iMac, OSX 10.6.2 and a Snow Leopard Upgrade DVD OSX 10.6. I do have the downloaded copy of OSX Mountain Lion that I pulled from the App Store the other day and that copy is now on an external USB / Firewire 800 HD.
As I said I would like to be able to clean off the iMac's internal 2tb drive completely and install a fresh newer OSX. If I first have to load OSX.6.2 then upgrade via the App Store that's fine, but I'd rather just go straight to Mountain Lion if possible. Whatever works best. Getting rid of any corruption on the iMac's HD is the prime motivation.
All my applications and files are backed up to a 2tb LaCie external drive.The iMac has approximately 900 gb's of content onboard and the rest is free / unused space.
I would very much appreciate all the help and suggestions as to how I can safely go about the wipe and re-installation of a fresh OS. I fear doing this without good advice I could very well "brick" the iMac!
Thanks!
PM

I would like to revert to OSX Lion. How can I do this,
Revert to a Previous OS X
would it be possible to install Lion on a separate partition
Yes. Boot into the Recovery Volume again and use Disk Utility to partition the disk.
Is the Installer in your Applications folder? That is where it downloads to. When you start it, you can point it at the new partition and install it there.

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Re-formatting iMac's Corrupted Hard drive..Suggestions please

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