Airframe Structural Analysis Engineer

Crossfire Consulting is a staffing company and this position is for our direct client, Blue Origin:

Airframe Structural Analyst - Onsite Role Contract - Kent, WA OR Highlands Ranch, CO

***AIRFRAME STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS - REQUIRED

Job Description

This role supports the development of the 2nd Generation of New Glenn, a heavy-lift orbital launch vehicle capable of routinely carrying people and payloads to low-Earth orbit, geostationary transfer orbit, cislunar, and beyond. This position will be directly involved in the design of the next progression of New Glenn Payload Accommodations hardware, including the larger diameter 8.7M payload fairing and adapters.

As part of a small hardworking team of engineers, you will be responsible for strength analysis of primary and secondary structures for New Glenn Payload Accommodations structure. In this role, you will take ownership of designs from concept through launch, perform initial sizing, analysis, development, testing, and qualification of structural subsystems, and work directly with our manufacturing teams to ensure successful hardware integration.

We are looking for someone to apply their technical expertise, leadership skills, and commitment to quality to positively impact safe human spaceflight. Passion for our mission and vision is required!

Responsibilities include:

• Take ownership of the full lifecycle of hardware from requirements definition through concept development, design, analysis, testing, qualification, and integration
• Analyze, develop, and test primary and secondary metallic and composite unpressurized structures
• Complete hand calc and FEM analyses to report margins of safety for primary and secondary aerospace structures
• Documentation of stress analysis to support release of engineering drawings and documents
• Perform research, develop concepts, and run trade studies providing technical guidance (risk vs. cost vs. performance)
• Build system and detail level models supporting structural design
• Take ownership of structural test planning, execution, data reduction, analysis, and authoring of test reports
• Prepare technical content and present to internal and external customers
• Collaborate with internal and external teams throughout design, manufacturing, and mission integration

Minimum Qualifications:

• Minimum of a B.S. degree in engineering and 6+ years of experience with aircraft, spacecraft, or launch vehicle structures
• Must be a U.S. citizen or national, U.S. permanent resident (current Green Card holder), or lawfully admitted into the U.S. as a refugee or granted asylum.
• Experience on recently developed aircraft or launch vehicles in one or more of the following areas: Vehicle load path distribution, and first order strength assessment and sizing. Skin-stringer, orthogrid, isogrid, and composite sandwich panel design.
• Experience working in a multi-functional organization to develop designs and produce world-class engineered products
• Strong understanding of composite and metallic design fundamentals
• Demonstrated expertise with any industry standard analysis codes: Ansys, Nastran, Optistruct, Hypermesh
• Experience in bolted joint design and analysis
• Structural design experience using CAD (Creo/Windchill preferred), hand calculations, and FEA tools
• Ability to take ownership of the hardware lifecycle from requirements definition through concept development, design, analysis, testing, qualification, and integration onto a launch vehicle
• Strong written and verbal communication skills
• Collaborative attitude and effective interpersonal skills
• Self-motivated with a strong desire to learn, take ownership, and drive projects to completion

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience with rapid development techniques for hardware
• Experience with fabrication using automated fiber placement (AFP) and tape laying (ATL)
• Experience or expertise with fabrication of large-scale out-of-autoclave composite structures
• Demonstrated experience developing manufacturing processes for transition to production
• Knowledge of systems engineering practices, fabrication and integration processes, and quality control
• Experience with Optimization and Design of Experiments (DOE) methods as applied to design, analysis, and testing