Lead Manufacturing Engineer, Harnessing Torrance, CA LA Manufacturing – Avionics

Castelion is moving incredibly fast to develop and deliver advanced defense systems at a time when execution matters more than ever. We believe focus, ownership, and excellence are decisive advantages - and we're building a world-class team to turn bold ideas into real capability.

This is a rare opportunity to join at an early stage, where you'll have significant ownership, collaborate with exceptional teammates, and make a direct, measurable impact on our mission and the future of the company - regardless of your function.

Castelion is seeking a Lead Manufacturing Engineer to own the development, qualification, and scaling of manufacturing processes for wiring harnesses, cable assemblies, interconnect systems, and associated test systems. This role will serve as the technical manufacturing lead for harnessing, driving both in-house and supplier capabilities from prototype development through high-rate production in support of next-generation defense systems.

• Build & Develop the Harness Manufacturing Team – help grow a high-performing team of manufacturing engineers and technicians by supporting recruiting, interviewing, onboarding, training, and technical development. Establish clear technical standards, ownership, and expectations that enable the team to operate effectively as production scales.
• Establish & Scale In-House Harness Manufacturing Capability – own the manufacturing strategy, process architecture, tooling standards, work instructions, training, and production flows required to build and test high-reliability harness assemblies at increasing production rates.
• Establish & Qualify a Production Harness Supply Chain – lead the identification, evaluation, qualification, and development of external harness suppliers. Define supplier capability requirements, workmanship standards, test coverage, audit criteria, and process validation requirements to ensure suppliers can meet production, quality, and schedule needs.
• Drive On-Time, Defect-Free Harness Production – own manufacturing execution and readiness for harness assemblies supporting development, qualification, and production vehicles. Establish quality gates, production metrics, and escalation mechanisms that prevent workmanship, continuity, electrical, and configuration defects from reaching integration.
• Build a Scalable Harness Manufacturing System – identify and implement the equipment, automation, test infrastructure, workforce development, and process improvements required to transition harness production from prototype builds to repeatable, high-rate manufacturing.

• Manufacturing Process Ownership – own harness manufacturing processes from incoming material through fabrication, inspection, electrical test, and final acceptance. Develop and maintain work instructions, MBOMs, process flows, tooling requirements, and manufacturing specifications.
• Technical & Team Leadership – serve as the manufacturing technical authority for harness fabrication and test. Mentor engineers and technicians, support hiring and onboarding, establish best practices, develop technical capability across the team, resolve complex manufacturing issues, and drive standardization across harness programs.
• Supplier Development & Qualification – partner with Supply Chain and Quality to qualify and develop external harness suppliers. Lead supplier audits, process reviews, capability assessments, production readiness reviews, and corrective actions.
• Design for Manufacturing & Test – partner with design engineering throughout the product lifecycle to improve manufacturability, testability, connector selection, routing, strain relief, serviceability, and assembly robustness. Drive DFM/DFT…