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Salary: USD 82,000 - 123,000 / annual
Rocket Lab is seeking a Spacecraft Propulsion Systems Engineer I to join the propulsion engineering team in Long Beach, CA. You will own system-level and component-level development of spacecraft propulsion and fluidic systems, supporting the Space Systems division on cutting-edge programs for civil, commercial, and defense customers. The team has enabled over 1,700 missions, including interplanetary exploration, in-space manufacturing, and national security initiatives, with spacecraft and components deployed to the Moon and Mars.
Key responsibilities include:
- Own development of new or existing propulsion products and systems, acting as technical lead through the end-to-end development process
- Perform conceptual and detailed mechanical design in CAD for propulsion system components, including performance calculations and analysis
- Review and approve drawings, 3D PMI, reports, and specifications from team members
- Plan, set up, instrument, execute, and analyze test data for propulsion systems
- Communicate with internal and external project stakeholders
- Make technical risk-based decisions to identify optimal engineering solutions
- Manage project schedules, identify priorities, task engineers and technicians, and communicate status to leadership
- Mentor and coach team members on technical and professional development
- Define and maintain standards of excellence through documentation, training, and review of others' work
- Contribute to engineering process development and documentation at Rocket Lab
Required Qualifications:
- Bachelor's degree in an engineering discipline
- Experience in propulsion system development or other high-performance field
- US citizenship (required due to program requirements and ITAR regulations)
- Ability to obtain and maintain a security clearance
Desired Qualifications:
- Passion for engineering with a curious mindset and willingness to learn
- Detailed mechanical design experience using NX (preferred) or equivalent CAD software and PLM software such as Teamcenter (preferred), Windchill, or similar
- Comfort working with high levels of ambiguity
- Ability to make decisions using engineering principles, literature, standards, risk assessments, test data, and physics-based models
- Experience with propulsion systems using storable propellants (electrical and chemical)
- Track record of design reviews and approving release of flight parts, qualification reports, and flight hardware decisions
- Project planning and management experience with delivery against schedule
- Experience developing requirements and verification sets, writing test plans, performing testing, and writing test reports
- End-to-end development process experience including requirements gathering, detailed design, qualification, production, and acceptance testing
- Python proficiency for data manipulation and post-processing
- Demonstrated hands-on engineering skills inside or outside the workplace
- Hands-on integration and testing experience (ideally with NI equipment and software)
- GD&T and engineering drawing experience
- National Instruments data acquisition system experience
- Flight hardware testing and troubleshooting experience
- Master's or PhD in engineering
