Mechanical Engineer

Astrobotic is enabling sustainable access and utilization of the Moon, Mars, and beyond. Through its recent acquisition of Masten Space Systems, we’ve been building and flying reusable rockets for nearly two decades with the most successful rocket-powered landings in the industry. We work directly with NASA, defense, and commercial customers to develop the tech it takes to break down the barriers to space. Together, we’ll make wild napkin ideas possible by taking them from the lab, to the test site, all the way to the lunar surface and beyond. 

This position will be primarily involved in developing Xogdor, a clean-sheet vertical-takeoff vertical-landing rocket that will serve as a suborbital testbed to help NASA, defense and commercial customers to validate landing technologies for the Moon and beyond. Our Structures team is looking for one or more structural/mechanical engineers to join us at the Mojave location.

Include with the application a copy of your resume with a cover letter first, your resume second, and a portfolio at the end if you have one. These documents should be combined into one pdf of less than 10MB and have a filename in the format of Lastname_Firstname.pdf. Only applications in this format will be reviewed. Your portfolio should show projects you have worked on in a hands-on capacity. School projects, prior work projects, or even home projects are acceptable. Include pictures and descriptions of what your part in the project was if it was a team project.

Key Duties and Responsibilities

• Help to design, fabricate, integrate, and test the rocket’s physical components and systems.
• Interact closely with interfacing systems, may also be called upon to work with customers or other departments within Astrobotic.
• Design, analysis and fabrication of pressure vessel and propellant tanks, pressure vessel interfaces and components such as anti-slosh baffles, structural bulkheads, liquid/gas fittings, quick disconnect fittings, slosh analysis, pressure vessel failure modes and NDE and failure testing.
• Design, analysis and fabrication of landing gear, including shock absorption and lock and release mechanisms.
• Design, analysis and fabrication of composite structures and molds for OOA manual layups.
• Design of vehicle material, component, and subassembly-level test methods and fixtures, and both NDE and test-to-failure programs.
• Assess designs for manufacturability

Required Skills and Experience

• B.S. in Mechanical Engineering or a related field
• 3+ years of professional experience
• Demonstrated ability to design and analyze prototype level components and tooling
• Demonstrated proficiency in Solidworks
• Demonstrated ability to document and present summary results of project work
• Familiarity of design with and analysis of a wide range of materials (including common aerospace metals and composites) and material processes (including welding, composites manufacture, bonding, fastening and 3d printing).
• Familiarity with interfacing systems including aerodynamics, GNC, thermal, electrical and propulsion and how these systems may affect or depend on vehicle structures.
• Familiarity with installation and data acquisition/data analysis of various sensors for collecting structural and system data (strain gauges, thermocouples, pressure transducers, accelerometers, etc.).
• Analysis using hand calcs and basic FEA.

Desired Skills and Experience

• Solidworks skills beyond basic CAD work, such as drawing generation, FEA analysis, Flow Simulation, etc.
• Familiarity with best practices for bonding and fastening composite structures.
• Drawing generation & GD&T
• Experience designing for part manufacturability
• Ability to assess components for manufacturability
• Experience with additive manufacturing, i.e. design for AM, material properties, post-processing, etc.
• Hands-on fabrication experience including manual mill and lathe, CNC operation, and common welding processes
• Rocket launch conops

To conform to U.S. Government space technology export regulations, including the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) you must be a U.S. citizen, lawful permanent resident of the U.S., protected individual as defined by 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3), or eligible to obtain the required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State.

Astrobotic Technology, Inc. does not discriminate in employment on the basis of race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy and gender identity), national origin, political affiliation, sexual orientation, marital status, disability, genetic information, age, membership in an employee organization, retaliation, parental status, military service, or other non-merit factor.

If you need assistance and/or a reasonable accommodation due to a disability during the application or the recruiting process, please send a request to contact@astrobotic.com.