Senior Staff Engineer - FEA

AAR Corp•Cadillac, MI

About The Position

The ideal candidate will possess expertise in structural finite element analysis of multi-component assembly systems for military environments. Ensures reliability, efficiency, and compliance with demanding operational and transportability conditions. Performs a variety of engineering work including such areas as production design, manufacturing processing, test, analysis, development, and efficiency.

Requirements

BSME or Engineering Bachelors Degree from ABET accredited school or equivalent, may have a Master Degree and may be a registered professional engineer.
Minimum 5 years of relevant work experience.
Strong knowledge of Lean Manufacturing, Six Sigma, and continuous improvement tools.

Responsibilities

Structural and Component Design: Proficiency in analyzing complete container and shelter designs. Conducts engineering analysis using FEA software to determine and certify the safety and performance of new designs. Works with design team to evaluate and refine initial engineering designs before full-scale production. Performs calculations and simulations to identify potential design issues and recommends solutions. Analytically proves out new engineering designs to verify customer requirements and industry standards are met. Strong experience with Nastran, FEMAP, Ansys (or equivalent FEA software) for structural analysis including static stress, modal, response spectrum, random vibration, frequency response, transient stress, and critical buckling. Writes detailed engineering test reports for customer and government approval and certification. Familiarity with Creo, AutoCAD, Solidworks, SpaceClaim CAD 3D, or equivalent software models for structure analysis. Experience in Excel, Mathcad, Mathematica, or equivalent. Performs and directs testing to ensure compliance with engineering specifications.
Environmental and Durability Engineering: Knowledge of designing systems to withstand shock, vibration, extreme temperatures, blowing sand/dust, and blowing rain tests. Familiarity with many aerospace, industry, and DoD standards including ISO 1496 or Convention for Safe Containers (CSC), MIL-STD-810, ASTM 1925, MIL-STD-1791 for transportability, and environmental testing. Expertise in material selection for corrosion resistance, lightweight construction, and overall robustness to ensure structural integrity under limited maintenance and harsh conditions.
Integration and Optimization: Awareness of system integration challenges for military platforms. Ability to balance compact sizing for efficiency, and lightweight design while meeting performance requirements and maintaining operational redundancy for mission-critical reliability.
Prototyping, Testing, and Validation: Hands-on experience building and validating prototypes, including testing at non-standard conditions. Skills (including special considerations for stringent requirements), for Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (FMEA), ensuring structure meets or exceeds ratings under military-specific demands.
Troubleshooting and Field Support: Proven ability as a primary troubleshooter for systems in production and field settings, including root cause analysis and iterative design optimizations based on feedback.
Regulatory Compliance and Documentation: Understanding of DoD regulations on transportability and environmental standards. Experience reviewing government technical specifications and designing equipment from the ground up to meet the requirements.
Collaboration and Project Management: Ability to gather requirements through technical meetings and collaborate on cross-functional aspects like interface design. Useful skills in project tracking (e.g., using tools like Microsoft Project) and preparing status updates or reports.