Senior Manufacturing Engineer, Fabrication

The posting, as Antares wrote it

About Us

At Antares, our long-term mission is to make clean energy abundant from Earth to the Asteroid Belt. We’re fueled by the belief that advanced nuclear energy can strengthen our military, solve the climate crisis, elevate global living standards, and expand humanity's presence in outer space. To achieve our mission, we’re building mass-producible, inherently safe, deployable microreactors that can be used terrestrially, underwater, and in space.

The Antares team hails from SpaceX, the White House, the Pentagon, the Department of Energy, MIT, Rigetti Computing, General Atomics, Relativity Space, Ursa Major, and National Laboratories like Idaho, Oak Ridge, Los Alamos, and Savannah River. Antares has raised over $600M in venture capital from top-tier investors and has hundreds of million-dollars on contract with the military services, NASA, and the Department of Energy.

About the Team

As a Senior Manufacturing Engineer – Fabrication at Antares, you will own the development and maturation of manufacturing processes used to build critical reactor hardware. You will work across design, materials, quality, and manufacturing to turn first-of-a-kind designs into hardware and establish the processes required to produce that hardware reliably and repeatedly. This role spans a broad range of fabrication technologies, with a primary focus on welding, metal forming, and CNC machining, as well as special processes including additive manufacturing, brazing, and diffusion bonding. You will operate with a high degree of autonomy, solving complex manufacturing problems and developing new capabilities where established solutions do not exist. You will work directly with machinists, welders, technicians, suppliers, and engineers to rapidly iterate on hardware while developing robust and controlled manufacturing processes.

Role & Responsibilities

• Own fabrication processes for critical Antares reactor components and assemblies from initial development through qualified production.
• Develop and improve fabrication processes, including welding, CNC machining, and metal forming, additive manufacturing, brazing, and diffusion bonding.
• Develop manufacturing methods for first-of-a-kind hardware and mature them into robust, repeatable production processes.
• Partner with design and materials engineering to influence component design, material selection, joint configuration, tolerances, and other requirements to improve manufacturability.
• Lead DFM reviews and identify manufacturing risks early in the design cycle.
• Define manufacturing sequences, process parameters, tooling requirements, inspection methods, and process controls.
• Develop manufacturing plans, work instructions, process specifications, and qualification documentation.
• Develop and execute process qualification plans using dimensional inspection, metallography, mechanical testing, NDT, and other verification methods as appropriate.
• Work hands-on with technicians, machini

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• The customer and end user are often not the same. We will never build globally competitive commercial products if we lose sight of our end users and their entire interaction with the product life cycle
• Be Unconstrained by Convention - Our only limits are the laws of physics. Many, even experts, will say what we are working on is impossible. They said the same about SpaceX reusing rockets. Generationally impactful companies, by definition, must accomplish the seemingly impossible. If it were easy, it would have already been done. Never shy away from a solution because it has never been tried before, and never choose to do something because that's “how it's always been done”
• Go Where the Work Is - Never miss a chance to meet a customer, user, or stakeholder face to face, even if that means hopping on a plane. If you can’t make it, find a teammate who can channel your intentions and go in your place. Deep work can be done from anywhere, but we believe teams are built in person, and aim to maximize our time together
• Operate in the Grey - Embrace nuance in pursuit of truth. Question every fundamental assumption

Equal Opportunity

Antares is an Equal Opportunity Employer. Employment decisions are based solely on merit, competence, and qualifications, without regard to race, color, religion, gender, national origin/ethnicity, veteran status, disability status, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, mental or physical disability, or any other legally protected status.

ITAR REQUIREMENTS

To conform to U.S. Government export regulations, applicant must be a (i) U.S. citizen or national, (ii) U.S. lawful, permanent resident (aka green card holder), (iii) Refugee under 8 U.S.C. § 1157, or (iv) Asylee under 8 U.S.C. § 1158, or be eligible to obtain the required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State. Learn more about the ITAR here https://www.pmddtc.state.gov/?id=ddtc_kb_article_page&sys_id=24d528fddbfc930044f9ff621f961987.