At a glance
- Experience
- 1+ years experience
- Location
- Hawthorne
About the role
- As an engineer within the Materials Engineering department, you will use your knowledge, experience, and creativity to solve difficult material and process challenges to enable highly reliable, low-cost, and continuous access to space.
- Ensure safe spaceflight of crew and critical cargo on Dragon through materials qualification and certification.
Responsibilities
- Own multi-flight qualification and certification of polymeric and elastomeric materials used on Dragon.
- Provide guidance to engineering and production teams on materials selection, testing and analysis of non-metallic materials.
- Lead root cause investigations and failure analysis as a subject matter expert in nonmetallic materials.
- Develop innovative material solutions that increase performance life, improve reliability, and reduce refurbishment processing.
- Guide design changes through ownership of material specifications, requirements, property allowable generation, drawing reviews, and manufacturability assessments.
- Own external customer communication and deliverables regarding certification and launch readiness, alongside coordinating technical discussions with multidisciplinary teams.
- Interface with suppliers on technical issues, including material non-conformances and root cause investigations.
Requirements
- Bachelor’s degree in materials science and engineering, polymer science, chemical engineering, chemistry, physics, or a STEM field.
- 1+ years of hands-on experience in materials characterization, manufacturing, and/or materials development (internship or project experience accepted).
Preferred qualifications
- Master’s degree or PhD in materials science and engineering, polymer science, chemical engineering, chemistry, physics, or a STEM field.
- Hands-on experience developing, processing, testing, and qualifying aerospace polymeric and elastomeric materials, including silicones, structural adhesives, sealants, plastics, textiles, composites, and thermal protection materials.
- Experience in polymer characterization methods and laboratory techniques, including SEM-EDS, FTIR, DSC, TGA, LFA, DMA, TMA, rheometry, optical microscopy, and mechanical property testing.
- Experience in failure analysis, with broad knowledge of degradation mechanisms and failure modes of polymeric materials.
- Effective written and verbal communication skills.
- Demonstrated attention to detail and a record of producing accurate technical deliverables.
- Strong interpersonal and collaborative skills, with a strong desire to both learn from and mentor others.
- Experience preparing clear technical deliverables for engineering teams and external customers.
Benefits
- Company stock or long-term cash awards
- Discretionary bonuses
- Employee Stock Purchase Plan
- Comprehensive medical, vision, and dental coverage
- 401(k) retirement plan
- Short and long-term disability insurance
- Life insurance
- Paid parental leave
- 3 weeks of paid vacation
- 10 or more paid holidays per year
Workplace
- Willingness to travel as needed.
Skills
- SEM-EDS
- FTIR
- DSC
- TGA
- LFA
- DMA
- TMA
- Rheometry
- Optical Microscopy
- Mechanical Property Testing
