Vehicle Structures Design Engineer II

Relativity Space•Long Beach, CA

5d•$104,000 - $156,000

About The Position

Relativity Space is building rockets to serve today’s needs and tomorrow’s breakthroughs. The Terran R vehicle will deliver customer payloads to orbit, meeting the growing demand for launch capacity. Joining Relativity means becoming part of something where autonomy, ownership, and impact exist at every level. You will be solving problems that haven’t been solved before, helping develop a rocket, a factory, and a business from the ground up. You’ll collaborate across teams, shape decisions, and see your work come to life in record time. Creativity and technical rigor go hand in hand, and your voice will help define the stories we’re writing together. This is an opportunity to leave your mark on the product, the process, and the culture, while Terran R is tangible and picking up momentum. The Structures and Mechanisms team is responsible for the full design, build, and test lifecycle of Terran R’s integrated structures and flight mechanisms. Team members work on multiple parts, not just within a single subsystem, and are empowered to make decisions that directly impact flight hardware. Beyond first flight, you’ll play a critical role in refining for manufacturability and speed. The scope of work encompasses designing parts and systems from early conceptualization through full release and supporting manufacturing for primary and secondary structures related to all stages of the Terran R rocket. You will need to think creatively and leverage innovation to optimize part geometry, ensure assembly packaging, prevent interferences and excessive gapping, reduce mass, and make parts fully manufacturable. You’ll also assist manage parts and assemblies throughout their lifecycles in PLM, and you’ll control BOM structuring and configuration management for many systems across the vehicle. On a weekly basis, you will be designing flight components for our upcoming Terran R vehicle using NX/TeamCenter, creating and releasing drawings as well as supporting fabrication of your components. You will also use your strong organizational skills to properly document your work and present your recommendations when decisions are needed.

Requirements

2+ years of experience in a design engineering role
Bachelor’s degree in engineering or a related discipline
Experience with industry-standard CAD packages such as NX, CATIA, Creo, or SOLIDWORKS
Fundamental knowledge of structures strength, stability and fatigue failure mechanisms
Self-motivated, adaptable and able to lead own projects to completion in a fast-paced environment
Proven track record completing collaborative projects effectively

Nice To Haves

1+ years of experience with NX/Teamcenter PLM
1+ years of experience with GD&T and drafting

Responsibilities

Design and develop piece parts, assemblies, and systems from early conceptualization up through full initial release – working with large machined metallic components, sheet metal, composites, formed panels, and more
Integrate critical design for manufacturing choices in direct coordination with the manufacturing engineering team
Perform packaging assessment of systems – resolve interferences, perform tolerance stack analyses, validate hardware stacks and fastener selections, integrate nominal gapping and shimming strategies, and more
Support BOM and configuration management of various systems across multiple vehicles
Create and release drawings as part of system release sprints post-CDR, including incorporating GD&T as primary definition