Avionics Mechanical Engineer - Summer Internship 2027

Inversion • Los Angeles, CA

6h • $38 - $41 • Onsite

About The Position

Inversion is an aerospace and defense company developing advanced reentry technology. Its Arc spacecraft is designed for rapid global cargo delivery, hypersonic testing, and national security missions. The company is headquartered in Los Angeles and designs, manufactures, and integrates spacecraft in-house.

As an Avionics Mechanical Engineering Intern, you will support the design, build, integration, and testing of mechanical hardware for flight avionics systems. You will work within the Avionics team with electrical, RF, embedded software, manufacturing, and vehicle engineering teams. The internship provides hands-on experience taking hardware from early concepts through detailed design, prototyping, fabrication, integration, and environmental testing, with a focus on aerospace structures, mechanical design, electronics packaging, thermal management, mechanisms, and rapid hardware development.

This summer 2027 internship requires in-office presence at the company's headquarters in Playa Vista, California. The current California annual base hourly rate is $38–$41. Pay is determined individually based on factors including job-related skills, education, experience, certifications, candidate abilities, and internal equity. To comply with ITAR, applicants must be U.S. citizens, lawful permanent residents, protected individuals under 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3), or eligible to obtain required U.S. Department of State authorizations. Inversion provides equal employment opportunities without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, national origin, veteran status, or disability.

Requirements

• Be enrolled in a bachelor's, master's, or doctorate degree program in mechanical engineering, aerospace engineering, or a related engineering discipline.
• Have a GPA of 3.0 or above.
• Have 3 or more months of applied engineering experience; internship, laboratory, and personal or team project experience is applicable.
• Have coursework or project experience in mechanical design, structures, materials, manufacturing, thermal systems, or related disciplines.
• Have experience using a 3D CAD package such as SolidWorks, Creo, NX, Fusion 360, or similar.
• Have strong problem-solving, written, and verbal communication skills, including the ability to communicate technical results clearly to multidisciplinary teams.

Nice To Haves

• Hands-on experience designing and building mechanical hardware.
• Experience creating engineering drawings with GD&T and appropriate manufacturing tolerances.
• Experience with machining, CNC, sheet metal, additive manufacturing, composites, or other fabrication processes.
• Familiarity with structural analysis, FEA, thermal analysis, or mechanical simulation tools.
• Experience designing mechanical hardware for electronics or embedded systems.
• Understanding of fasteners, joints, materials, tolerances, and mechanical interfaces.
• Experience with vibration, shock, thermal, or other environmental testing.
• Experience designing hardware through Formula SAE, student rocketry, CubeSat, robotics, or similar engineering projects.
• Experience working with PCBs, connectors, cables, harnesses, sensors, or other avionics hardware.
• Familiarity with aerospace hardware development, configuration control, or engineering change processes.
• Previous internship experience at a space, aerospace, or hardware startup.

Responsibilities

• Work with avionics and mechanical engineers to design, build, integrate, and test mechanical hardware for flight avionics systems.
• Support the design and packaging of flight computers, electronics, RF systems, sensors, batteries, and other avionics components.
• Create and modify 3D CAD models, assemblies, drawings, and manufacturing documentation.
• Support mechanical design reviews, including tolerance analysis, fastener selection, interfaces, manufacturability, and assembly considerations.
• Build and evaluate prototypes and engineering test articles using machining, additive manufacturing, sheet metal, composites, or other fabrication processes.
• Support vehicle-level avionics integration, including mechanical interfaces, mounting, harness routing, connector access, grounding and bonding provisions, and serviceability.
• Participate in environmental testing such as vibration, shock, thermal cycling, and thermal-vacuum testing.
• Assist with troubleshooting mechanical integration issues and rapidly develop hardware solutions to unblock testing and vehicle integration.
• Collect, analyze, and document test data and support engineering reports and design documentation.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Intern