Robotics Lab Hardware Technician

Welo Data•Santa Clara, CA

17h•Onsite

About The Position

The Robotics Lab Hardware Technician owns the physical hardware for a large-scale robot data collection operation, supporting research and low-volume production as robot embodiments, grippers, and camera rigs change. The technician maintains the fleet and the equipment used by a dedicated teleoperator team, helping ensure reliable, well-calibrated hardware and data quality. This is a full-time, 12-month contract role with the possibility of extension, based 100% onsite in Santa Clara, California. The listed schedule is Monday–Friday, either 7:00 AM–3:30 PM or 9:00 AM–5:30 PM, with flexibility for shift coverage as labs run extended hours. The start date is ASAP, and the rate is $40 per hour.

Requirements

At least 3 years of hands-on technician experience in a lab, prototyping, or low-volume build environment, such as robotics, medical devices, aerospace, or semiconductor equipment.
An associate degree in a technical field, a relevant trade or technical certificate, or equivalent hands-on experience.
Mechanical assembly fundamentals, including fasteners and torque, bearings, belts, and linkages.
Ability to read CAD and mechanical drawings using Onshape, SolidWorks, or similar tools.
Electrical skills including soldering and basic SMD rework, crimping and connectorization, harness building, and confident use of a multimeter and oscilloscope.
Comfort using Linux at the command line to connect to workstations via SSH, run calibration scripts, and read logs.
Experience with motors, encoders, and sensor integration, and understanding of how poor grounding or marginal cables can affect data streams.
Methodical, self-documenting work habits.
Ability to manage ambiguity and frequent change, and prioritize when supporting multiple labs.
Ability to work onsite in Santa Clara and flexibility with shift coverage as labs run extended hours.

Nice To Haves

Experience with humanoid or bimanual platforms such as Unitree, Fourier, ALOHA/ARX-class rigs, and dexterous hands.
Maintenance and calibration experience with collaborative or industrial arms such as UR, Franka, xArm, ARX, or equivalent.
Experience building and calibrating multi-camera rigs and working with RealSense, ZED, or Orbbec-class depth cameras.
Experience operating and maintaining FDM or SLA printers and designing simple fixtures and adapters.
Light Python or bash scripting to automate repetitive bench or calibration tasks.
Experience in a high-throughput lab or production line where uptime or yield was tracked.
Vendor-facing experience with RMAs, lead times, and spares planning.

Responsibilities

Build, wire, and bring up data collection stations, including robot arms, multi-camera rigs, workstations, teleoperation hardware, and durable cable management.
Maintain the robot fleet through daily checks, preventive maintenance, calibration routines, and fault diagnosis on arms, hands, and sensors.
Swap and integrate end-effectors, grippers, dexterous hands, force/torque and tactile sensors, and RGB-D cameras.
Run fleet calibration and firmware procedures, and identify hardware drift before it affects collected data.
Assemble and iterate prototype hardware using printed parts, off-the-shelf components, vendor-fabricated parts, and custom harnesses.
Perform soldering, crimping, connectorization, harness building, and PCB rework support at the bench.
Manage lab inventory of spares and consumables, parts kitting, bench and tool organization, and vendor shipping, returns, and RMAs.
Support teleoperators with hardware issues during live collection by triaging problems, fixing or escalating them, and restoring station operation.
Document work through build sheets, maintenance logs, calibration records, and hardware SOPs.
Help bring up new robot embodiments and stations alongside engineers and researchers.