Principal Welding Engineer

As a Principal Weld Engineer at Impulse you will help develop, qualify and optimize welding designs and processes with both laser beam, gas tungsten arc welding, friction stir welding, and orbital tube welding. This role will integral to performing weld developments on Helios' main structural tank, Deneb’s thrust chamber and preburner assemblies, and valve components across all of our vehicles. The welding engineer in this role will interface daily with design and manufacturing engineers to make welding judgment calls and improvements and will enforce standardized practices and procedures on multiple welded assemblies.

Helios is Impulse's new vehicle, a 3rd stage/kick stage. Launching in 2026, it is designed to take satellites & payloads to GEO for 1/3rd of today's current cost. Deneb is Impulse’s 15k lb thrust lox methane staged combustion engine.

Responsibilities

• Develop, optimize, and qualify weld processes and parameters for multiple welding processes including but not limited to: laser beam welding, friction stir welding, gas tungsten arc welding, orbital tube welding.
• Work closely with design, tooling, automation, and development engineers to improve welded designs for manufacturing
• Develop and implement improved process control where possible using test and NDE results as feedback loop
• Support production operations on full scale welded assemblies, providing direction to manufacturing engineers and welders on correct techniques in a fast paced manufacturing environment
• Support on-site manufacturing and development of Helios tank, Deneb engine weldments, and Mira components.
• Set up welding qualification test campaigns and interpret mechanical testing and NDE results
• Work closely with NDE personnel to interpret weld quality on development and flight hardware in addition to developing and implementing innovative state-of-the-art NDE techniques
• Set up automated welding solutions in an effort to drive process consistency
• Scope out new welding technologies that may be employed to improve rate/quality/efficiency
• Support design, manufacturing, and materials engineering with root cause analysis

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in an engineering discipline or related field 
• 10+ years of experience with hands-on fabrication, manufacturing, or testing experience of welded assemblies