In Photos: Kicking Into High Gear at Quad Bikes
Following a two-year hiatus due to the Covid-19 pandemic, Quad Bikes reopened in the basement of Cabot House in the fall of 2022. Crimson photographers took a tour of the space with Julian K. Li ’25, one of the students running Quad Bikes.Following a two-year hiatus due to the Covid-19 pandemic, Quad Bikes reopened in the basement of Cabot House in the fall of 2022. The undergraduate-run bicycle repair shop recently expanded its hours to serve Harvard students and Cambridge residents four days each week. Founded in 2003, the shop offers refurbished bicycles, affordable repair services, and bike maintenance classes. Crimson photographers took a tour of the space with Julian K. Li ’25, one of the students running Quad Bikes.
Outside the workroom, he selects a bike to refurbish from a selection of abandoned ones that Quad Bikes has collected.
Julian wheels the bike into the workroom, which is equipped with a variety of tools, parts, and mementos from the shop’s two-decade long history. As a Boston-area native, Julian learned how to repair bikes from YouTube tutorials and from working at a bike shop in Somerville.
To encourage more bike usage around campus, Quad Bikes currently offers free repairs and tune-ups for students. The shop strives to reuse parts from old bikes, keeping an impressive inventory of spare parts.
At his workstation, Julian adjusts an off-center bike wheel. He carefully re-tensions each spoke, checking the wheel’s balance along the way.
The shop’s front desk is adorned with a variety of trinkets – they may not accept payment, but they maintain healthy pizza and beer funds.
Quad Bikes is currently open two hours a day for four days each week, though they plan to extend their opening hours.
For bikes that can be fixed quickly, Quad Bikes offers walk-in repairs on the spot. For those that require more care and attention, Julian checks them into the shop.
While Quad Bikes currently operates as a team of two, they hope to expand their operations in the near future, training more repairers and taking in more bikes.
