Alex Chernyak – Gorbel® Mechanical Engineer
I live in Pittsford with my wife, Laura; we have been happily married for 42 years. We have two adult sons. I try to stay busy after work and plan my evenings and weekends ahead of time. Some of my hobbies include gardening, home remodeling, fishing, photography, reading, and writing.
I started working at Gorbel in March of 2008 after applying for a job online. Jim Stockmaster and Brian Peets were very gracious and offered me a job, which I gladly accepted.
The main reason I love my job is because we don't have “normal" days in Product Development.
Almost every day we perform different tasks and assignments. The most common are: developing a new product concept, estimating cost of the product, designing, building and testing the prototype, analyzing test results, finalizing production design and preparing all documentation for launching the product.
Besides working on regular projects, we provide technical support to the Manufacturing, Procurement, Service, Rehab and other Gorbel® departments.
My favorite part of my job is definitely designing a new product or improving an existing one.
I have had many memorable moments here at Gorbel® while working on different projects. One, which comes to mind, is the Shop Crane project. I really enjoyed working with Tim Loughlin, Chris Adams, Murray Hems, Dean Wright and others. Thanks to Murray’s idea, which evolved from Rafter Crane to Shop Crane, we delivered an interesting and unique product.
The most emotional moment of my engineering career happened at Gorbel, too. It occurred when a man with a prosthetic leg volunteered to be our test subject for the SafeGait® project and I watched as he took his first steps after not being able to walk for a year. A few years later and numerous rehab sessions at Nazareth College using our SafeGait® unit, the same man was able to walk his daughter down the aisle. Moments like that have kept me motivated and excited when I get up in the morning and get ready to go to work.
I’ve been very grateful for having had a lot of good teachers and mentors in my life. Every one of them contributed to who I have become today. My math teacher taught me that knowledge does not have any limits and she only gave me high grades when I found two or three solutions to the same problem. My first engineering manager taught me that when you design something you must be able to build it yourself. My military commander told me to remain calm under any circumstances, which later in life helped me solve many engineering problems during time sensitive projects. I can list many more people here, but the most influential teacher in my life was my father. He taught me discipline, responsibility, respect for other people, honesty and hard work.