Hi again,

I got sidetracked on the GT project, came down last week with some kind of nasty flu bug. This weekend I am finally back up to speed for the most part, so I took some time to finish tearing down the bike, cleaning/oiling/greasing/adjusting as necessary, and got it all put back together today. It was too late in the evening for a proper shakedown drive, but I did take it up and down my street once.

On the good advice of you all here, I decided to go through the bike as it is and not put any money into new parts yet. The good news is I do not need a new fork (well, no more than I need one to replace this cheap thing in the first place). This is a pretty barebones fork....it turns out there are a couple of big plastic bushings that are supposed to keep the lower fork positioned in the top section. These bushings had floated up off their bases on the lower fork, causing the slop. Only solution was to whack away with a rubber mallet to put them back in place, but the fork is now tight and wobble-free!



Frame was almost totally stripped, but not quite....bottom bracket seems to be good. I was going to take it apart and grease it for good measure, before I realized the newer style ones are not serviceable. Removal of the left crank was thus pointless, except to test my crank puller (it works...). Cable housings will probably get replaced if I keep the bike, but for now they are clean enough that a light oiling is all that was needed.

I probably will go ahead and get a new seat, this one is pretty uncomfortable....I can always put the seat on something else.

I don't know if the frame is too small or not....with the seat up a few inches from the frame, and the handlebars raised to the min insertion level, I got down the road alright. Perhaps time will tell. I need to find some larger bikes to test-ride, probably. I do have to say, it felt good to be on a bike again!

Matt