Engineer Jobs

About The Position

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in aerospace engineering, mechanical engineering, structural dynamics, or a related engineering discipline.
• At least 5 years of experience in spacecraft or launch vehicle loads and dynamics, structural dynamics, or dynamic environments engineering.
• Hands-on experience planning or executing vibration testing, such as random, sine, and/or modal survey, for aerospace hardware qualification or acceptance.
• Experience developing and analyzing dynamic finite element models using FEMAP/Nastran or equivalent, including modal, frequency response, and random response analyses.
• Experience deriving dynamic environments and load factors and performing associated margin-of-safety assessments.
• Proficiency with Python and/or MATLAB for analysis automation, test data reduction, and reporting.
• Experience using version control systems such as Git in an engineering analysis environment.
• Clear technical communication skills for documenting assumptions, test rationale, and results across disciplines and with customers and launch providers.
• Must meet applicable ITAR eligibility requirements as a U.S. person; employment is contingent upon verification of eligibility and, where applicable, obtaining required export authorization or license.

Nice To Haves

• Master’s degree or higher in aerospace engineering, mechanical engineering, or structural dynamics.
• Direct experience leading acoustic testing of spacecraft hardware, including test level derivation, blanket and chamber configuration, microphone placement, and acoustic-induced vibration response assessment.
• Experience with low-frequency testing and analysis, including sine vibration, low-frequency base-drive and modal survey, large-structure or vehicle-level modal testing, and low-frequency launch environments.
• Experience performing coupled loads analysis with a launch provider and managing launch provider loads-cycle deliverables and interface requirements.
• Experience leading spacecraft vehicle-level or large-assembly dynamic qualification and acceptance test campaigns.
• Experience with vibroacoustic modeling using FE/BEM and/or SEA tools such as VA One, Actran, or equivalent.
• Experience with shock testing and shock environment prediction, including pyroshock and separation events.
• Experience with vibration control systems and data acquisition, including notching and force limiting; examples include Siemens, m+p International, Spectral Dynamics, and Data Physics.
• Experience with test fixture and adapter design, including fixture modal characterization and effects on test fidelity.
• Experience with model updating, test-analysis correlation, and uncertainty quantification, including MAC and cross-orthogonality checks.
• Experience with propellant slosh, pogo, or fluid-structure interaction affecting spacecraft with propulsion systems.
• Familiarity with NASA-STD-7001, NASA-STD-7002, GEVS, SMC-S-016, and launch provider user guides.
• Experience working in a small, fast-moving team where the same engineer predicts, tests, and correlates, and analysis and test share ownership of the result.

Responsibilities

• Develop, maintain, and own spacecraft dynamic finite element and reduced-order models for loads, modal, and response analyses, with configuration control.
• Perform coupled loads analysis with launch vehicle provider models for launch events and manage launch provider interfaces and loads-cycle deliverables.
• Derive and maintain limit, design, and qualification load factors, interface loads, and component-level random vibration, sine, shock, and acoustic environments.
• Perform modal, frequency response, random vibration, shock response, and transient analyses to predict structural and component response and support margin-of-safety assessments.
• Perform vibroacoustic analysis to predict acoustic and acoustically induced vibration environments for panels, appendages, and lightweight structures.
• Assess low-frequency dynamics, including structural modes, sine and quasi-static launch environments, pogo and propellant slosh interaction, and coupling with propulsion or control systems.
• Support design trades involving stiffness, mass distribution, mounting, isolation, and damping.
• Define dynamic test strategies for components, subsystems, and the integrated vehicle, including modal survey, sine, random vibration, sine-burst, shock, and acoustic testing.
• Write test plans, requirements, and procedures, and provide pre-test analytical predictions, including response predictions, expected modal frequencies, and notching and force-limiting strategies.
• Define test setups, including fixture and adapter design requirements, accelerometer placement, instrumentation, boundary conditions, and abort limits.
• Lead and execute vibration, acoustic, and low-frequency tests at Portal and third-party facilities, serving as test lead or test conductor.
• Review test data in real time, including transfer functions, signature sweeps, and pre- and post-test low-level sine surveys, and make test decisions based on observed frequency or damping shifts.
• Select, qualify, and manage test facilities and vendors, and define facility, fixture, instrumentation, and data-system requirements.
• Correlate test data to analytical models using modal assurance criteria, frequency and mode-shape comparisons, and transfer-function matching; update models to meet correlation criteria.
• Produce post-test analysis reports, qualification and acceptance evidence, and verification artifacts that close requirements in the vehicle verification matrix.
• Assess test anomalies, over-tests, under-tests, and nonconformances and recommend disposition, retest, or analysis-based closure.
• Establish lessons learned, templates, and data standards for dynamic testing across vehicles and programs.
• Develop Python and/or MATLAB tools to automate loads processing, environment derivation, test data reduction, spectral analysis, correlation, and reporting.
• Partner with design engineers on mounting, isolation, and structural solutions that meet dynamic requirements while minimizing mass and cost.
• Collaborate with structural analysis, vehicle test, propulsion, avionics, GNC, and manufacturing teams to flow dynamic environments into component specifications and resolve dynamic issues.

Benefits

• Potential eligibility for company equity and bonuses.
• Comprehensive medical coverage.
• Vision coverage.
• Dental coverage.
• Access to a 401(k) retirement plan.
• Paid parental leave.
• Accrual of three weeks of paid vacation.
• Eligibility for 12 or more paid holidays per year.
• Sick time.