good thing the three of us answered that question!

Yeah, got that cleared up like a street sweeper.

So I went into my LBS to have that cog problem checked out. Unforetunetly we were all wrong. I did strip the hub. Luckily, its got two sides so the two and a half week old rear wheel is still operational. and now has a nifty new 17t dura ace cog... so i guess i'm a 48X17 now instead of the good old 48X16. I should have upgraded past the stock fuji cog. ended up paying for it in the end.

a 17tooth dura ace? maybe i just wasn't looking in the right places but i didn't think those existed.

Honestly, i didnt look at the packaging, but i trust my LBS. They've never led me astray. I asked for a 17t cog dude says we have this real nice dura ace (and we subsequently discovered that it was the only 17t the LBS carries... guess 17ts aren't that popular)... i can find out more if you're interested

you know what, I'm an idiot... you caused me to think back to the sad experience at the bike shop (as stripping your 2.5 weekold hub inevitably is)... it was a 17t Euro-Asia... my bad

darn, because of my lack of funds i was hoping a 17 was out there because i want to save that extra 9 bucks. oh well...

I just have to say this whole discussion illustrates the extreme sanity offered by the Level hub. www.levelconcepts.com. I change ratios with ease, and don't have to deal with lockrings. I don't worry about stripping (except for Terror in Pink). I'm never going back.

OK, I finally got the cog/lockring situation worked out. It took so long because of an unexplained disaster with my brake (it came to my attention while I was riding through downtown, thinking to myself how I probably shouldn't be riding with an unsecured lockring, immediately followed by some impatient joker turned left across my path and me squeezing the lever which promptly did almost nothing) and a blowout the next morning (oops, no rim strip - luckily it happened while replacing the brake).

After I got off work today, I rode uphill, applying as little backward pressure as possible, for about four miles to the LBS. There, I tightened the lockring until it would go no more. Put on a rim strip, paid my fifty cents, and went to the street to practice. A few three inch skids later meant success.

Many thanks to all who chimed in with their thoughts.