^ Good work. The stock freewheel is indeed hard to remove, it requires a tool that most bike shops aren't likely to carry and my bike shop couldn't even find the tool necessary to remove it. But that 3/4 socket extension sounds like a great idea.

Not much to update on, I've been sick for the past week so I haven't been riding much. Denali is in a state of semi-retirement for the winter. I've stripped everything unnecessary off of it and put it on the other bike to reduce weight. I'm waiting until I get to feeling better and have more time, at which point I plan on cleaning everything up and re-greasing all major bearings. After that it will be stored until warmer weather and faster riding returns!

The Free Spirit is doing fine as well. I've been having problems with the cottered cranks, and I understand why people dislike them so much now. They kept coming loose and ended up wearing out the stock pins, fortunately my LBS carried replacements. I also got a new chain since I wasn't sure how kind my reduced length chain (I had to initially remove a siezed link) was to the rear derailleur.

Now, I've got those pins on good and tight. Hopefully they'll last.

Last night I tried to do an experiment. I found that the cartridge bottom bracket from the Denali fit perfectly into the Free Spirit, so a cotterless conversion would be easy. I tried to mount up the Denali's stock MTB crankset just to see if it would work, but the geometry was all wrong and it would require me to get a different FD and result in a completely screwed up chainline even with the narrowest of bottom brackets. Too bad, I wouldn't have minded the gearing. But the budget is stretched out so I'm not willing to buy a replacement square taper crankset at the moment. But I'll be scouring the roadsides for junk bikes with cranksets I can use.

Cottered cranks aside, I'm having no problems with it. I'm hoping to take it on a mini-tour this weekend! 50 miles through the fall foliage. 70 miles on the odometer currently.
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