Principal Mechanical Engineer (Starship)

The role

You will own mechanical scope from concept through design, fabrication, construction, and commissioning. The work spans power generation, fluid and cooling systems, and production structures and equipment at Starbase.

What you will do

• Develop design concepts from a clean sheet and size infrastructure systems
• Collaborate with peers across disciplines to develop designs
• Create detailed designs and generate CAD models
• Build analysis models to assess designs
• Apply first-order hand calculations and empirical formulas to assess and iterate on designs
• Validate designs through development hardware, mockups, or first articles
• Support testing and commissioning of subsystems and full installations
• Partner with construction, build engineers, and technicians to improve designs
• Support installation of hardware in the field

Required qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in an engineering discipline
• 7+ years of experience with mechanical design and analysis
• Must be a U.S. citizen or national, U.S. lawful, permanent resident, Refugee under 8 U.S.C. § 1157, or Asylee under 8 U.S.C. § 1158, or be eligible to obtain the required authorizations from the U.S.

Nice to have

• Experience designing, analyzing, building, and testing high performance, mechanical systems
• Experience working within interdisciplinary teams to develop solutions to challenging and complex problems
• Experience with FEA or multiphysics simulation package (e.g. NASTRAN, ABAQUS, ANSYS)
• Experience designing and executing qualification testing
• Strong understanding of mechanical first principles and structural analysis methodologies
• Proficiency in selecting materials and manufacturing methods for mechanical components
• Analytical/scientific programming experience (i.e. Python, Matlab, Excel)
• Self-motivated with strong organizational, written, and oral communication skills

About the company

SpaceX is actively developing the technologies to make human life on Mars possible. The company was founded under the belief that a future where humanity is out exploring the stars is fundamentally more exciting than one where we are not.