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Salary: USD 202,000 - 223,000 / annual
Muon Space seeks a Staff Mechanical Engineer to own the design, qualification, and sustainment of deployable and actuated mechanical systems for spacecraft, including solar array deployables, solar array drive assemblies (SADA), hold-down and release mechanisms (HDRMs), hinges, dampers, and latches. These are mission-critical, single-point-failure systems.
As a foundational member of the new Solar & Deployables hardware group, you will drive requirements definition, mechanism design, analysis, prototyping, qualification, and transfer to production while collaborating across disciplines to deliver high-reliability solutions.
Key responsibilities include:
- Serve as technical owner for deployable and actuated mechanisms, setting architecture and design direction across missions
- Lead trades on deployable architectures and release-device technologies, balancing reliability, cost, and schedule
- Lead design, analysis, and optimization of deployment mechanisms, actuators, and release devices, including torque/force margin, structural, kinematic, tribological, and dynamic analyses
- Own single-point-failure management for deployables, including margin, redundancy, and test-coverage strategy
- Own mechanism qualification campaigns, including deployment testing with gravity offload, lifecycle testing, and environmental testing (random vibration, TVAC, shock)
- Define and champion mechanism design standards and best practices that scale across the organization
- Mentor mechanical engineers and lead rigorous design reviews (PDR, CDR, MRR)
- Drive mechanisms from prototype builds to constellation-scale production, applying lessons learned from builds, tests, and on-orbit operations
Required qualifications:
- B.S. in Mechanical Engineering or related technical field
- 10+ years designing, building, and testing mechanisms or deployable hardware, with 5+ years in the space industry
- Deep expertise in solar array deployables, SADA, HDRMs/release devices, hinges, dampers, or precision mechanisms
- Strong command of mechanism analysis: torque/force margin, kinematics, bearings/tribology, preload, and stiffness
- Proven track record qualifying single-point-failure mechanisms, including deployment, life, and environmental testing
- Expert-level CAD (SolidWorks preferred), GD&T, drawings, BOMs, and tolerance/mass/torque budgets
- Excellent communication and presentation skills
Nice-to-have: flight heritage in space-qualified deployables, direct SADA design experience, NASA-STD-5017 or ECSS qualification experience, organizational standards-setting experience, vendor/contract manufacturer management for flight hardware.
Position is hybrid, requiring three days per week on-site in San Jose, CA office.
