Aircraft Loft Engineer

Haast Autonomous•Pendleton, OR

About The Position

Haast Autonomous is building an autonomous aircraft network for time-sensitive medical logistics. We’re developing long-range VTOL aircraft, autonomy software, and the operational foundation needed to move critical payloads between hospitals, labs, and healthcare facilities on-demand faster and more reliably. We’re early, small, and moving quickly. Joining now means you'll have a direct role in shaping the foundation of Haast — our culture, engineering process, testing discipline, partner relationships, and the path from prototype to a real medical logistics network. We’re looking for high-agency people who want ownership, urgency, and system-level impact from day one. The Role Haast is seeking a Senior CAD Loft Engineer to own the geometric definition and master CAD models for our aircraft. This is a highly specialized CAD position focused on aircraft lofting, advanced surfacing, outer-mold-line development, and production-quality design definition. You will convert aerodynamic inputs, airfoil data, packaging requirements, and preliminary aircraft layouts into precise, continuous, manufacturable aircraft geometry. You will be responsible for establishing and maintaining the master aircraft model from which structures, tooling, molds, drawings, and production parts are developed. Approximately 70–80% of this role will involve CAD modeling, surfacing, product definition, and drawing release. The ideal candidate has previously lofted complete aircraft or major airframe sections and can demonstrate aircraft geometry that has been manufactured, assembled, and flown.

Requirements

At least two years of professional experience in aircraft lofting, airframe surface design, aerospace CAD, or aircraft product definition.
Demonstrated experience developing the outer mold line or master geometry for a complete aircraft or major airframe assembly.
Expert proficiency in CATIA, Siemens NX, Creo, SolidWorks, or an equivalent production CAD platform.
Advanced capability in complex surfacing, multi-section lofting, guide-curve development, boundary surfaces, surface trimming, blending, and repair.
Strong understanding of surface continuity, spline behavior, curvature control, and the relationship between aerodynamic intent and manufacturable geometry.
Experience with aircraft coordinate systems, airfoil data, wing planforms, fuselage sections, aerodynamic intersections, and control-surface geometry.
Experience building stable master-model or skeleton-model CAD architectures that support multiple engineers and downstream parts.
Ability to translate conceptual aircraft geometry into production-quality models, drawings, tooling, and manufacturing data.
Understanding of GD&T, tolerance analysis, engineering drawings, assembly interfaces, and configuration control.
Experience with composite, molded, machined, or fabricated aerospace structures.
Portfolio or work samples demonstrating complex aircraft lofting and surfacing work.

Nice To Haves

Experience with fixed-wing UAV, eVTOL, general-aviation, or experimental-aircraft development.
Experience lofting composite fuselages, wings, fairings, nacelles, payload doors, and aerodynamic transitions.
Proficiency with CATIA Generative Shape Design, Siemens NX Shape Studio, or equivalent advanced surfacing environments.
Experience importing, cleaning, and controlling airfoil coordinates and aerodynamic reference geometry.
Familiarity with PDM or PLM systems, model-based definition, release workflows, and aerospace configuration-control practices.
Experience developing molds, tooling surfaces, trim fixtures, assembly jigs, and composite manufacturing data.
Familiarity with CFD geometry preparation, mesh-ready surface cleanup, and exchanging geometry with aerodynamic-analysis tools.
Hands-on experience supporting aircraft fabrication, assembly, inspection, and flight testing.

Responsibilities

Own and maintain the authoritative master CAD model and outer mold line for Haast aircraft.
Develop complete aircraft lofts from airfoil coordinates, aerodynamic surfaces, station data, packaging envelopes, and configuration layouts.
Create production-quality surfaces for the fuselage, wings, wing-body intersections, fairings, nacelles, booms, empennage, payload doors, access panels, and propulsion integrations.
Establish aircraft coordinate systems, reference geometry, waterlines, buttock lines, fuselage stations, master sections, datums, and interface locations.
Build robust parametric models using master sketches, skeleton models, guide curves, boundary surfaces, multi-section lofts, and top-down design methods.
Maintain appropriate positional, tangent, and curvature continuity across complex aircraft surfaces.
Evaluate surface quality using curvature analysis, zebra analysis, deviation checks, section cuts, and other CAD inspection methods.
Convert outer-mold-line surfaces into manufacturable composite structures, skins, cores, bulkheads, ribs, spars, frames, and bonded assemblies.
Develop accurate split lines, trim definitions, offsets, tooling surfaces, molds, plugs, fixtures, and assembly references.
Ensure that aerodynamic surfaces remain controlled as structural, payload, propulsion, avionics, and manufacturing requirements evolve.
Manage external references, model dependencies, naming conventions, configurations, revisions, and released CAD data.
Identify and resolve surface gaps, discontinuities, intersections, minimum-radius problems, thickness conflicts, and non-manufacturable geometry.
Produce detailed part models, assemblies, engineering drawings, interface-control drawings, GD&T, tolerance definitions, and bills of materials.
Work closely with aerodynamicists, structural engineers, manufacturing partners, and the flight-test team to incorporate design changes without degrading the master geometry.
Support fabrication and assembly by investigating CAD discrepancies, tooling issues, part-fit problems, and deviations from design intent.
Help establish Haast’s standards for CAD architecture, geometric control, drawing release, and configuration management.