Senior Mechanical Design Engineer - Delivery Drone Electric Motor
San Francisco, CA (you can work from home up to 2x/week)
The team builds small, lightweight autonomous delivery drones with safety-first hardware designed to operate around people and everyday urban infrastructure. The work has a positive impact on the sustainability, access, and cost of everyday necessities.
You would be joining an elite group of about 60 people and 20 engineers inside a much larger public company. This org operates as a small, fast-moving hardware innovation lab: minimal bureaucracy, real build/test cycles, and ownership of systems that ship and operate at a very large scale.
The company is targeting a salary range of $200k, plus RSUs translating into total first year compensation of roughly $300k.
Job Responsibilities
- 50% of the job will be designing motors, 50% of the job will be electric motor manufacturing development.
- 20% of the time will involve travel to suppliers.
- Collaborating closely with electro‑mechanical design experts on winding and magnet design.
- Collaborating closely with internal, domestic and foreign manufacturing partners.
- Collaborating closely with electrical, systems, structural, aerodynamics, reliability, and test engineers as well as industrial design to refine requirements.
- Designing mass and volume optimized rotor and stator structures.
- Bearing selection and bearing system design.
- Electrical wiring and connector selection and integration.
- Motor sensor selection and integration (rotary encoders, temperature, etc.).
- Performing structural and thermal finite element analysis (FEA) to optimize performance and reliability.
- Starting to finish ownership of motors from concept through production.
- Building prototypes, fixtures, and testing hardware using CNC tools and 3D printers.
- Designing for outdoor commercial operation including ingress protection and harsh environmental survival.
Qualifications
- A bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering.
- At least 3 (ideally 5-10) years of professional experience as a mechanical engineer.
- Experience with dynamic mechanical systems (motors, actuators, mechanisms, etc.).
- Strong 3D modeling (CAD) skills for complex parts and assemblies.
- Self sufficient with at least basic structural and thermal simulation.
- Self sufficient with hands‑on prototyping, metal fabrication, and 3D printing.
- Competence with assembly and test fixture design.
- Familiar with electromechanical integration and wiring practices.
- Experience designing hardware for outdoor or harsh environments.
- Strong understanding of manufacturability and assembly methods.
- Comfortable working in an exploratory, fast‑paced environment.
- Experience creating 2d drawing using ASME Y14.5 geometric dimensioning and tolerancing (GD&T).