Senior Electrical Engineer-Operations

Acron Aviation•Grand Rapids, MI

2d•Onsite

About The Position

Acron Aviation is seeking a Senior Electrical Engineer to join the Displays Zero Defect team at its Grand Rapids, Michigan facility. The role serves as the team’s electrical design subject matter expert, working with Product Quality, Manufacturing, and Test Engineering to identify and permanently resolve defects throughout the production lifecycle, including supplier, factory, integration, calibration, and test-related issues. The position focuses on electrical design defect resolution. The engineer applies hands-on electronics and Circuit Card Assembly (CCA) expertise to determine whether recurring defects are caused by schematic design, component selection, circuit behavior, PCB layout, design margin, environmental sensitivity, manufacturability, or testability. In partnership with Design Engineering and Operations, the engineer validates root causes, implements corrective actions, and helps improve product robustness, yield, quality, and cost performance. Acron Aviation designs, engineers, and manufactures certified avionics systems for safety-critical commercial and military aviation. The Displays product line develops and sustains cockpit display systems, including primary flight displays, multi-function displays, engine indication and crew alerting systems (EICAS), mission displays, and integrated cockpit visualization solutions. The work takes place in highly regulated environments and involves avionics systems, hardware and software development, human factors engineering, certification, and safety-critical product design. Applicants may need to qualify as a U.S. Person to access information, technology, software, or hardware subject to U.S. export control laws and regulations. The company conducts pre-employment substance abuse testing and background checks where allowed by law.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or a closely related engineering discipline.
At least 3 years of experience in electrical design, hardware engineering, sustaining engineering, product engineering, failure analysis, or a related electronics role.
Hands-on experience troubleshooting electronic assemblies, Circuit Card Assemblies, or complex electrical systems.
Ability to interpret schematics, PCB layouts, component data sheets, design requirements, tolerance information, and test results.
Experience investigating product failures, developing root-cause hypotheses, and validating corrective actions through analysis or testing.
Working knowledge of structured problem-solving methods such as A3, RCCA, 5-Why, Fishbone, 8D, or PDCA.
Ability to collaborate and influence across Design Engineering, Manufacturing, Test, Quality, Supply Chain, and Operations.
Experience in a regulated or high-reliability industry such as aerospace, defense, medical, automotive, or industrial electronics.
Must qualify as a U.S. Person if required to access information, technology, software, or hardware subject to U.S. export control laws and regulations.

Nice To Haves

Experience with avionics, displays, recorders, surveillance systems, or other high-reliability electronic products.
Practical CCA design experience, including schematic development or review, component selection, PCB layout review, design-margin analysis, or design verification.
Experience supporting electronics in production, sustaining engineering, reliability engineering, or manufacturing failure analysis.
Familiarity with Design for Manufacturing (DFM), Design for Test (DFT), and common electronics manufacturing processes.
Knowledge of IPC Class 3 workmanship expectations and AS9100-regulated environments.
Familiarity with electronic failure mechanisms such as solder-joint reliability, thermal stress, component derating, intermittent connections, layout-induced sensitivity, tolerance stack-up, and test-induced failures.
Exposure to Lean manufacturing, continuous improvement, or formal Zero Defect operating systems.

Responsibilities

Lead technical investigations of recurring defects with suspected electrical or electronic design causes.
Analyze schematics, PCB/CCA layouts, component specifications, circuit behavior, interfaces, tolerances, and test data to identify failure mechanisms.
Determine whether failures originate from design, components, suppliers, manufacturing, environmental conditions, testing, or system interactions.
Identify design-margin, component-derating, signal-integrity, thermal, layout-sensitivity, and test-access issues affecting product quality and yield.
Develop recommendations to improve product robustness, manufacturability, and testability.
Serve as the electrical engineering subject matter expert on the Displays Zero Defect team alongside Product Quality, Manufacturing, and Test Engineering.
Assess defect Paretos and production data to identify patterns warranting electrical design investigation.
Support defect investigations across suppliers, incoming material, manufacturing, integration, calibration, testing, and final acceptance.
Contribute electrical design expertise to A3, RCCA, 5-Why, Fishbone, and PDCA problem-solving activities.
Help distinguish symptoms from root causes and select corrective actions that prevent recurrence rather than rely on inspection, rework, or containment.
Partner with Design Engineering to define, review, implement, and validate design-related corrective actions.
Plan and support technical evaluations, experiments, and testing to confirm root-cause hypotheses.
Assess corrective-action effectiveness using defect recurrence, RTY/FPY, retest, rework, and failure data.
Provide design-informed recommendations for component changes, circuit improvements, layout updates, process controls, screening strategies, test conditions, and work instructions.
Capture lessons learned and support applying improvements to related products and future designs.
Collaborate with Design, Product Quality, Manufacturing, Test, Supply Chain, Operations, and Program teams to resolve complex product issues.
Communicate electrical findings, risks, and recommended actions clearly to technical and business stakeholders.
Prioritize technical work based on safety, product risk, defect recurrence, yield, delivery, and cost impact.
Identify opportunities to reduce cost of poor quality by permanently eliminating recurring electrical and design-related defects.