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The Exploration Company is building innovative aerospace technologies for space transportation. You will join as a CAD & Stress Analyst focused on designing and structurally justifying propulsion systems, with particular emphasis on the Thrust Chamber Assembly (TCA).
You will own parts from initial CAD layout through final stress justification, collaborating closely with manufacturing and test teams to bring flight hardware from concept to qualified design.
During the Design Phase, you will:
- Design thrust chamber and injector propulsion hardware in CAD from concept layout through detailed design
- Perform stress analysis using hand calculations and FEA (Ansys, Abaqus, or equivalent) to substantiate margins of safety under mechanical, thermal, and pressure loads
- Select materials and define manufacturing processes in coordination with manufacturing engineering
- Work with propulsion, thermal, and fluidic system engineers to translate functional requirements into part-level design and load cases
- Establish and maintain interface definitions, drawings, and part datasets with configuration control and traceability
- Conduct trade studies on design options (geometry, material, manufacturing route) and justify decisions with analysis
- Elaborate and maintain structural analysis reports supporting design reviews and qualification
- Support definition of test requirements to validate analytical models and structural assumptions
- Produce and maintain technical documentation of design choices, analysis methods, and results
During Manufacturing, Assembly, and Test phases, you will:
- Support manufacturing and inspection of parts, resolving design or tolerance issues
- Support root-cause investigations of structural anomalies or test findings
- Update and correlate stress models based on test and inspection results
- Support design iterations and upgrades based on test campaign outcomes
The company emphasizes agility, open collaboration, transparency about risks, and a mission-driven culture focused on democratizing space.
REQUIREMENTS:
- Bachelor's degree in Aerospace, Mechanical Engineering, or similar
- Minimum 1 year of related experience in CAD design and stress analysis of mechanical or structural hardware, ideally in propulsion, aerospace, or high-reliability environments
- Strong CAD skills to take parts from concept to fully detailed, manufacturable design
- Solid grounding in structural/stress analysis including hand calculations and FEA
- Familiarity with manufacturing processes (machining, additive manufacturing, welding/brazing) and their impact on design and structural performance
- Excellent collaboration skills across departments
- Fluency in English
- Nice to have: CFD experience for thermal or flow-related analysis of propulsion hardware
