Mechanical Engineer III (spacecraft Structures)

Spacecraft Structures Engineer

Firefly Aerospace is on a mission to enable our world to launch, land, and operate in space – anywhere, anytime. Our launch vehicles, lunar landers, and orbital vehicles provide government and commercial customers with full mission services from low Earth orbit to the surface of the Moon and beyond. Firefly is looking for passionate, hardworking innovators to join our team and help fuel our successful trajectory into space.

Firefly is looking for an experienced spacecraft structures engineer to develop our state-of-the-art primary and secondary structures throughout the product life cycle for both our Blue Ghost Lunar Lander and Elytra vehicles. You will be part of a highly skilled, dynamic team that will involve you in all aspects of analysis, design, fabrication, and testing. Excellent collaboration and communication skills, along with a positive attitude are critical.

Responsibilities include:

• Firefly engineers own and influence the entire hardware design cycle including conceptual design, structural layout, sizing analysis, hardware production, and structural testing.
• Design and development of composite and metallic structures for orbital and lander spacecraft.
• Mass and production rate optimization of existing designs and requalifying designs.
• Supporting production teams with onsite review and verification as well as providing timely closure of non-conformance dispositions.
• Support configuration development and trade studies for future spacecraft missions.
• Maintain requirements compliance and verification, hardware delivery schedule, mass budgets and inter-system collaboration activities.
• Create CAD, manufacturing drawings, specifications, analysis reports, test plans and reports.
• Perform first order strength and sizing calculations for your structure, working alongside stress and dynamics analysts to document critical strength capabilities.

Qualifications:

Required:

• B.S. degree in aerospace, mechanical, or civil engineering and 5+ years of experience in aerospace or related structures engineering.
• Strong design and integration skills using 3-D CAD software (Siemens NX / FiberSim preferable).
• Strong understanding of ASME Y14.5 and drafting techniques for component and assembly specifications.
• Ability to effectively work in a multi-discipline team and provide technical guidance and insight.
• Demonstrated experience with precision structural integration and manufacturing techniques.

Desired:

• M.S. degree in aerospace or mechanical engineering and/or 5+ years of experience.
• Working knowledge of composite manufacturing methods, material selection, testing, and characterization.
• Experience with industry FEA/FEM tools like Nastran, ANSYS, FEMAP, Simcenter, etc.
• Experience with advanced honeycomb panel design and manufacturing techniques, including heat pipe integration and thermal control systems.
• Experience with vehicle level static and vibroacoustic testing.
• Familiarity with aerospace standard structural analysis methods (Bruhn, Niu, Roark, etc).

Firefly offers outstanding benefits for our employees, including generous health, dental and vision plans with low plan deductibles, parental leave, educational reimbursement, short term disability, and flexible PTO options.

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.

Firefly Aerospace, Inc. is an Equal Opportunity Employer; employment with Firefly is governed based on merit, competence and qualifications and will not be influenced in any manner by race, color, religion, gender, national origin/ethnicity, veteran status, disability status, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, mental or physical disability or any other legally protected status.