Mechanical Engineer Intern (Winter 2027)

The role

You will own a subassembly and its parts from first sketch to validated hardware. You will design, analyze, build, and test parts on the robot.

What you will do

• Own a subassembly and its parts through design, hand calcs, FEA, fabrication, assembly, and validation
• Own the supporting analysis: hand calcs, tolerance stack-ups, fastener and material selection, and basic FEA
• Build, assemble, and test your own parts on test fixtures and on the robot
• Iterate fast: turn feedback from a failed test into a revised part the same week

Required qualifications

• 1-4 years of mechanical design experience (exceptional new grads with strong project or internship work are welcome to apply)
• Solid fundamentals: statics, materials, tolerance analysis, fasteners, and basic FEA
• Experience building things: student teams, products that shipped, prototypes that worked
• Hands-on machining experience
• Able to work on-site in San Francisco 5 days/week (6 days/week if needed during crunch time)

Nice to have

• Experience at a hardware, robotics, aerospace, or automotive company
• CAM experience (Fusion 360) or comfort programming your own toolpaths
• Comfort using AI tools to multiply your own output

About the company

Gradient builds the autonomous robots that make datacenter buildout possible. They are partnered with the world's largest AI infrastructure companies.