Over the past month or so, I have realized that I no longer use the third chainring on my 3x8 drivetrain. There are 4 screws located around the chain ring that appear to hold the third chain ring to the second chain ring. I tried to unscrew these but they have a very shallow hole and are very hard to unscrew. I'd like to convert my drivetrain from 3x8 to 2x8 but these screws are the only thing screwing it up. (pun intended). I assume that this, like many bike parts, need special tools to take apart. Is it possible to take off the third chainring on this drivetrain? Will I need a special tool? Or should I just replace the 3 chainring drivetrain with a 2 chainring one?

Josh