Lead Turbomachinery Engineer

As a trusted talent partner, Infotel is working with Drove Aeropower to build a world-class team. We are looking for outstanding candidates who are eager to contribute to a dynamic and growing organization.

Drove Aeropower builds advanced gas turbine systems for some of the most demanding applications in energy and defense, built around high power density, rapid deployment, and domestic manufacturing. We move with the speed and ownership of a startup while tackling engineering problems normally reserved for much larger organizations.

Own the rotating hardware at the heart of the machine.

You will be responsible for the components that spin, carry load, survive operating conditions, and ultimately determine whether the machine works.

• Turbine stages. Aerodynamic and mechanical design of blades, vanes, and shrouds, including stage matching.
• Disks, shafts, and rotor architecture. Load paths, torque transmission, bearing arrangement, alignment, thermal growth, couplings, and rotor retention.
• Bearings, seals, and secondary flow. Bearing loads, lubrication, and support concepts; seal architectures, leakage, clearances, and cavity flows.
• Hot-section materials and cooling. High-temperature alloys, coatings, heat treatments, and blade cooling.
• Rotor dynamics and vibration. Critical speeds, stability, balance, Campbell diagrams, resonance, and forced response.
• Life and margins. Stress, creep, LCF, HCF, thermal‑mechanical fatigue, overspeed, burst margin, component‑life predictions, and inspection requirements.

• Define instrumentation and test requirements, run spin tests, overspeed tests, component rigs, and full‑system validation, and correlate analytical models with real hardware performance.
• Lead root‑cause investigations (vibration, thermal distress, bearings, cracking, wear, imbalance) and drive corrective action through redesign and re‑test.
• Design with manufacturing and suppliers for parts that are producible, inspectable, and scalable across machining, casting, additive manufacturing, coatings, and balancing.
• Manage critical turbo machinery suppliers, and transition prototype hardware into controlled production designs with drawings, specifications, inspection criteria, and manufacturing controls.
• Spot system‑level risks early and drive them to closure. Turbo machinery is never an isolated discipline here.

• Bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering, aerospace engineering, or a related technical discipline
• ~10+ years in gas turbine, jet engine, turbo machinery, or high‑speed rotating machinery development
• Strong turbine hot‑section experience, with hands‑on design of blades, vanes, disks, shafts, or bearings
• Command of turbine aerodynamics, heat transfer, solid mechanics, rotor dynamics, and mechanical design
• Experience with high‑temperature materials, coatings, and turbo machinery manufacturing processes, plus a firm grasp of creep, fatigue, fracture, vibration, burst, overspeed, and life prediction
• Full hardware cycles behind you, from design through test, failure investigation, redesign, and production
• Ability to interpret and create drawings, tolerance schemes, specifications, test plans, and manufacturing requirements, with familiarity in balancing, bearing systems, and high‑speed rotating equipment
• Sound judgment with incomplete information, comfort with suppliers and technicians, and clear communication

• Controls. Speed limits, acceleration schedules, overspeed protection, and transients.
• Mechanical. Housings, mounts, bearing supports, exhaust, lube, and structural interfaces.
• Combustion. Inlet conditions, pattern factor, and hot‑section durability.
• Electrical. Generator and accessory interfaces, torsional behavior,…