Structural Stress Analysis Engineer — Nastran​/Patran

Give a bold aircraft design a rigorous structural foundation. Your analysis and test correlation will help ASKA understand how its airframe carries load, connecting design decisions to evidence the whole engineering team can use.

Working under the Lead Structural Stress Analysis Engineer, substantiate assigned composite and metallic structures that carry ASKA’s flight and ground-operation loads. Build finite-element models in Nastran and Patran, combine analysis with engineering calculations, and work with design and test teams to establish structural margins and supporting evidence. Airframe Design owns geometry and implements agreed design changes.

Employment Full-time proposed

Location & work arrangement Eagle Field
· Palo Alto area / remote for analysis and design to be defined; hands-on integration and test visits to be discussed; availability for occasional testing at Eagle Field Airport required, with advance coordination

Assigned structural analyses, margins and stress reports under the Lead Structural Stress Analysis Engineer’s technical direction.

The Lead Airframe Design Engineer owns airframe geometry, structural layout, physical packaging and design decisions; the Airframe Design Engineer creates detailed parts and assemblies. Loads supplies aircraft load cases and aeroelastic assessments. Stress evaluates strength, buckling, fatigue and structural margins and recommends design changes. Airframe Design implements and releases geometry changes. Mass Properties maintains weight/CG records. Propeller engineering owns blades and hubs;
Aircraft Systems coordinates vehicle requirements and subsystem integration.

• Build and maintain global and local finite-element models using Patran for model preparation and results review and Nastran for analysis.
• Represent and verify structural load paths, boundary conditions, material properties and joints in analysis models, using geometry and load cases agreed with Airframe Design and Loads.
• Perform static strength, buckling and modal assessments, checking mesh sensitivity, equilibrium and whether idealizations suit the engineering question.
• Evaluate laminates, metallic fittings, fasteners and bonded joints using suitable failure criteria and independent calculations.
• Assess fatigue or damage-tolerance implications for assigned components and coordinate specialist analysis where the substantiation scope requires it.
• Plan structural tests and correlate measured stiffness, strain and modal response with analytical predictions.
• Assess the structural effect of design changes and manufacturing deviations, and document recommended dispositions for authorized review.
• Prepare controlled stress reports covering assumptions, load cases, margins, model validation and unresolved limitations.
• Develop and continually improve verification checks and model-to-test correlation for assigned structural analyses; document acceptance criteria, uncertainty and discrepancies, and use findings to improve repeatability and analysis quality.

• Bachelor’s degree in aerospace or mechanical engineering, or equivalent demonstrated structural-analysis expertise.
• 5+ years of aircraft structural stress analysis, including responsibility for documented substantiation.
• Minimum 3 years of hands-on experience with Nastran AND minimum 3 years with Patran, covering finite-element model preparation, solver setup, model checking and engineering interpretation of results.
• Strong understanding of composite and metallic structural behavior, joints, buckling, load paths and failure modes.
• Experience verifying finite-element results with hand calculations and correlating predictions with…