Senior Vehicle Structures Design Engineer

Relativity Space; Long Beach (CA); On-site; USD 132,000 - 198,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive salary

Equity

PTO & sick leave

Parental leave

Learning stipend

Job summary

Relativity Space in Long Beach, CA, is seeking a design engineer to advance Terran R structures and flight mechanisms. You will design parts and systems from concept through release, collaborating with manufacturing to ensure parts are fully manufacturable and integrated into large vehicle BOMs.

You’ll create drawings, manage GD&T, and support lifecycle management in PLM across multiple vehicle assemblies. A hands-on, self-motivated leader with strong CAD skills will thrive here.

Qualifications

• 4+ years of experience in a design engineering role.
• Bachelor’s degree in engineering or related discipline.
• Experience with CAD packages such as NX, CATIA, Creo, or SOLIDWORKS.
• Fundamental knowledge of structures strength, stability and fatigue failure mechanisms.
• Ability to navigate large vehicle BOMs and work with large assemblies.

Responsibilities

• Design and develop parts and systems from concept through full release, supporting manufacturing.
• Integrate design for manufacturing with the manufacturing engineering team.
• Perform packaging assessment, tolerance analysis, and fastener selections.
• Create and release drawings post-CDR and manage BOM/configuration data.

Skills

Design engineering

Structures knowledge

BOM management

Large assemblies

Education

Bachelor’s degree in engineering or related discipline

Tools

NX

CATIA

Creo

SOLIDWORKS

Job description

At Relativity Space, we’re building rockets to serve today’s needs and tomorrow’s breakthroughs. Our Terran R vehicle will deliver customer payloads to orbit, meeting the growing demand for launch capacity. But that’s just the start. Achieving commercial success with Terran R will unlock new opportunities to advance science, exploration, and innovation, pioneering progress that reaches beyond the known.

Joining Relativity means becoming part of something where autonomy, ownership, and impact exist at every level. Here, you're not just executing tasks; you're solving problems that haven’t been solved before, helping develop a rocket, a factory, and a business from the ground up. Whether you’re in propulsion, manufacturing, software, avionics, or a corporate function, you’ll collaborate across teams, shape decisions, and see your work come to life in record time. Relativity is a place where creativity and technical rigor go hand in hand, and your voice will help define the stories we’re writing together. Now is a unique moment in time where it’s early enough to leave your mark on the product, the process, and the culture, but far enough along that Terran R is tangible and picking up momentum. The most meaningful work of your career is waiting. Join us.

About The Team

The Structures and Mechanisms team is responsible for the full design, build, and test lifecycle of Terran R’s integrated structures and flight mechanisms. Whether you’re working on highly iterative mechanisms that move or tight-margin structures that shouldn’t, you’ll get hands‑on hardware ownership and see the rocket coming to life on the factory floor. Both teams fall under one department, sharing design principles, tools, and an integrated approach that provides a comprehensive view of Terran R. Team members work on multiple parts, not just within a single subsystem, and are empowered to make decisions that directly impact flight hardware. Beyond first flight, you’ll play a critical role in refining for manufacturability and speed.

About The Role

• The scope of work encompasses designing parts and systems from early conceptualization through full release and supporting manufacturing for primary and secondary structures related to all stages of the Terran R rocket. You will need to think creatively and leverage innovation to optimize part geometry, ensure assembly packaging, prevent interferences and excessive gapping, reduce mass, and make parts fully manufacturable. You’ll also assist manage parts and assemblies throughout their lifecycles in PLM, and you’ll control BOM structuring and configuration management for many systems across the vehicle.
• Your responsibilities will include, but not be limited to the following:
• Design and develop piece parts, assemblies, and systems from early conceptualization up through full initial release – working with large machined metallic components, sheet metal, composites, formed panels, and more
• Integrate critical design for manufacturing choices in direct coordination with the manufacturing engineering team
• Perform packaging assessment of systems – resolve interferences, perform tolerance stack analyses, validate hardware stacks and fastener selections, integrate nominal gapping and shimming strategies, and more
• Support BOM and configuration management of various systems across multiple vehicles
• Create and release drawings as part of system release sprints post-CDR, including incorporating GD&T as primary definition In order to be successful in this role, you must be someone who is self-motivated, adaptable and is able to lead your own projects to completion in a fast-paced environment. Ideally, you have significant mechanical or structural design experience and a proven track record completing collaborative projects effectively.
• On a weekly basis, you will be designing flight components for our upcoming Terran R vehicle using NX/TeamCenter, creating and releasing drawings as well as supporting fabrication of your components. You will also use your strong organizational skills to properly document your work and present your recommendations when decisions are needed.

About You

• 4+ years of experience in a design engineering role
• Bachelor’s degree in engineering or related discipline
• Experience with industry-standard CAD packages such as NX, CATIA, Creo, or SOLIDWORKS
• Fundamental knowledge of structures strength, stability and fatigue failure mechanisms
• Ability to work in the context of large assemblies and effectively navigate large vehicle BOM’s

Nice To Haves But Not Required

• 2+ years experience with NX/Teamcenter PLM
• 3+ years experience with GD&T and drafting

At Relativity Space, we are committed to transparency and fairness in our compensation practices. Actual compensation will be determined based on experience, qualifications, and other job-related factors.

Compensation is only one part of our total rewards package. Relativity Space offers competitive salary and equity, a generous PTO and sick leave policy, parental leave, an annual learning and development stipend, and more! To see some of the benefits & perks we offer, please visit here.

Hiring Range

$132,000—$198,000 USD

We are an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status.

If you need a reasonable accommodation, please contact us at [e-mail].