Raleigh 20 Update

As yet another project continues to wend its' way though my life, here is the latest little bit of progress on the Raleigh 20 that I picked up a little while back.

I have been working on removing the ugly green brush paint from the frame, but it is tedious and the turpentine fumes do get to be a bit much after a while.

As such, my first sidetrack was to remove the front wheel. I took off the original 1.75X20 dry rotted tire and tube and tossed them into the trash. After some inspection, it appears that the front tire had never been removed. I ditched the factory rim strip which also looked quite virginal. I got ahold of my preferred rim tape, the cloth Velox style and stuck it on the rim, the tape looked to be made for 700c rim, so I used my trusty Swiss Army knife to make the cut.

Now here is the rub, I have some nearly new Schwalbe Big Apple Tires and tubes that I had in the cupboard from a Dahon that I upgraded. These tires are 20X2". Will they fit? I am pretty sure that they will fit the rims but as the mudguards are connected directly to the axle and not to an eyelet on the fork, I am worried that there won't be clearance between the fatter Big Apples and the mudguard stays. I will mount them up and see how it goes.