Elroy Air – Mechanical Engineer, Robotics
At Elroy Air, we are building autonomous vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) cargo aircraft systems that will change the way the world moves goods. Transporting cargo by air has so much potential! It’s much faster than by land or sea, but before recent developments in perception, autonomy, electric powertrain and aerospace materials – air transport has remained expensive. We’re going to change that. And we’re solving big problems; the commercial express logistics industry worldwide needs faster + better transport and spends $140B annually, and our men and women in uniform need a reliable unmanned aerial cargo delivery system.
Our future partners and customers are responding enthusiastically. As we prepare to fly our vehicles with customers, we are looking for people like you: motivated teammates excited by this mission and by the rare opportunity to develop a world-class autonomous aerial logistics system. You will play a critical role in bringing the Elroy Air system to the world.
As an early member of Elroy Air’s Robotics team, your role will be to conceptualize, design, build, and test the novel electromechanical and robotic systems that will empower our robot to perform its autonomous cargo handling and self-taxiing behaviors during the ground phase of its mission.
You’ll design and integrate mission-critical mechanisms, actuators, sensors, and electronics enclosures. You’ll collaborate closely with experienced engineers and designers to work through the challenges of aerospace-grade component design, thinking critically about aspects like safety, reliability, serviceability, weight, and cost.
You’ll see your systems come to life quickly, moving from sketch to prototype to low rate manufacturing in a fast paced startup environment. Employing Design for Manufacturability principles, you’ll select the best production processes, design for those processes, and interface with manufacturing partners and vendors to ensure that our systems meet our performance goals and cost targets.
This is a full time position in our South San Francisco office, with some remote work and work from home flexibility. Since this position involves working with physical systems, you’ll need to work from the office some or most days. However, we have a flexible work from home and remote work policy for those times when you can get your work done effectively at home.
Strong candidates will embody the following
- You have Mechanical, Aerospace, Mechatronic, or Robotic Engineering experience directly pertaining to vehicles or robotic systems.
- You’re skilled at designing, building, and maintaining complex electro-mechanical and/or robotics systems.
- You are equally comfortable with both closed-form and numerical methods of analysis and know when each is appropriate.
- You’re an excellent technical communicator and can quickly and accurately describe issues to teammates, whether they are technically oriented or not.
- You use data and observations to communicate issues rather than making unjustified assumptions.
- You enshrine your decisions in high quality documentation, and you proactively communicate your findings to stakeholders.
- You understand engineering tradeoffs and timelines, and you prioritize smartly to maximize quality.
Competencies
- Experience and proficiency with CAD packages such as Solidworks, Creo, NX, etc.
- Experience working collaboratively with electrical, software, and mechanical engineers to design complex systems.
- Experience with engineering analysis techniques such as stress, thermal, and vibration analyses.
- Demonstrated hands on fabrication experience with common machine tools and rapid prototyping techniques. Proven experience bringing prototypes to life quickly.
- Knowledge of GD&T techniques and ability to create and read mechanical drawings.
- Bonus points for experience in weight-constrained problem domains such as aerospace.
- Bonus points for experience with safety critical systems.
- Bonus points for electrical engineering experience, especially power electronics, wire harness design/fabrication, and RF engineering.
6-month outcomes
- The components you have designed are currently flying onboard our aircraft during flight and ground testing and are enabling our autonomous cargo carrying mission.
- Your work has been validated and tested on our full scale prototype aircraft during ground trials at our flight test facility.
- You’ve built prototypes and hardware-in-the-loop test fixtures at our office and shop facility, and have rigorously stress tested your components prior to integrating them on the aircraft.
What’s in it for you
- Competitive salary and equity packages.
- Medical/dental/vision/long term disability/life insurance base plan premiums covered 99% by Elroy Air.
- 401(k) with broad access to low-cost investment funds, paid parental leave, and highly flexible vacation policy.
- You’ll work with and learn from a diverse and highly skilled team.
- You’ll help define a new category of robotics, and you’ll work on novel and never-before-built systems.
- As an early addition to a quickly growing team, you’ll help shape and define company culture and values.
- You’ll work in a hands-on office and testing facility minutes from downtown San Francisco.
Elroy Air values and strives for diversity in our workforce and does not discriminate based on applicant identity in accordance with equal employment opportunities and federal, state, and local law. We define diversity as a variety of perspectives, life experiences, and backgrounds that form a person’s identity. This includes not just gender identity and race, but also; ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender expression, religion, age, ability, parenthood status, veteran status, citizenship status, or any combination of these characteristics.
We encourage you to apply even if you aren’t an exact match for our open role, many of our team members come from nontraditional backgrounds.
All employees will be screened through E-Verify.
This position will require access to information protected under U.S. export control laws and regulations, including Export Administration Regulations (EAR). Please note that any offer for employment will be conditioned on any required authorization to receive software or technology controlled under these U.S. export control laws and regulations necessary to perform the responsibilities of the position.
