removing front wheel - tools required ?

[darrsi]

thanks
greasing the axle sounds like a plan.
regular grease or a bit of copper ?

You should consider getting yourself a torque wrench if you're gonna work on the bike yourself, because it's very easy to under/over-tighten bolts which can cause thread problems. I'd say it's more common to over-tighten stuff, which is why you get people on here with rounded allen key heads, or snapped bolts.
You'd be amazed how little force is needed for correctly tightening things up.
You really should use a heavy lithium based grease for the spindle, or what's more commonly known as 'axle grease' funnily enough!