Hi!
I’m Philip Perivolaris, a collector of hobbies.
In the past I have held positions at Bloorview Kids Rehab in the R&D side of things, developing individualized and specialized assistive prosthetic devices. These projects included designing circuits and mechanical systems which would have a human interface to help our clients in life-altering ways, generally with a turn-around time of two weeks to a month max after the initial meeting. We developed our own circuit boards in-house and had access to a CAD/CAM machine shop across the hall.
As an undergrad I lead many peer study groups as well as volunteering my time in a research lab, overseeing and directing the research and development of prototypes where the MaSC and PhD students were having trouble. With my history, the professor that ran the lab was eager to bring me on board and it was a very rewarding experience.
My Engineering Capstone (Thesis) project was to develop an automated microscope staging and analysis system with +/-100µm of travel in the X and Y for manipulating the sample, and +/-10µm of travel in the Z for the camera. This was a project that I brought to the school, working with the industry liaison’s office and an external partner, I drafted a grant proposal and we were awarded funding through the OCE. Ultimately the project was successful; utilizing stepper motors and ball threads we were able to achieve a resolution of 0.24µm per step and met the displacement requirements. The client was pleased and has since undertaken the development of the vision-driven control software.
For the past 11 years I have volunteered my time and knowledge to mentoring a First Robotics Canada team, Team 907 – East York Cybernetics [link opens in new tab] (or simply The Cybernauts), where I readily direct the students on the team in topics ranging from trajectory calculations, or developing equations of motion. This high school is one of few left in the TDSB with a metal-capable machine shop, and the team has access to it, where I direct them on safe and proper use of the mills, lathes, drilling and tapping techniques, as well as good design vs. bad design and the reasons why with an emphasis on manufacturability (since what the students design, they themselves must produce).
In what little spare time I seem to have these days I continue to keep myself educated on the goings-on with OpenSource hardware and software and keep trying to push the boundaries of what I know, expanding my knowledge base. Over the years I have built-up a fairly comprehensive lab setup at home which is ever-growing as I acquire new skills and as I challenge myself and what I know.
I rebuild watches and radios, develop linear amplifiers and motor controllers, as well as having projects go awry–but is there any better way of learning than through doing? The main purpose of this site is to keep a record of my experiments, projects, and thoughts in one place, and I appreciate you joining me here to collaborate.
My hope is that I can teach you something, and you can teach me something. Red Green put it best, “Remember, I’m pulling for ya. We’re all in this together!”
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