Staff Mechanical Engineer - Rings

Company Overview

Mainspring Energy is revolutionizing power generation with the world’s most flexible and adaptable onsite power generator, the Mainspring Linear Generator. Commercial, industrial, and utility leaders are choosing Mainspring over traditional options like engines, turbines, and fuel cells to quickly and reliably deliver local power for EV charging, commercial facilities, data centers, and grid-scale operations. The Mainspring Linear Generator is fuel flexible, ramps up and down to meet demand, and utilizes a flameless technology with near-zero NOx emissions.

Backed by top-tier investors such as Khosla Ventures, Bill Gates, American Electric Power, and Lightrock, Mainspring designs, manufactures and delivers its products to customers across the U.S. today, and we’re quickly scaling for international expansion.

Inspired by our vision of the affordable, reliable, net-zero carbon grid, Mainspring is rapidly expanding within the $816B global electricity equipment market, and we’re hiring the best talent to meet growing customer demand around the globe. We welcome a broad range of backgrounds, experiences, and talents to bring fresh perspectives and ongoing innovation to our customers.

We are looking to build relationships with people who share our values:

Pragmatic Optimism. Building a new category of world-class power generation requires the optimism of ambition and creativity, balanced with practicality to solve problems efficiently. The challenges that arise are opportunities for growth.

Excellence without Ego. We bring expertise and commitment to creating the best customer experience, from sales to deployment and service, just as we apply deep technical rigor to building and delivering world-class products. We strive for excellence and behave as leaders with the humility to acknowledge our challenges, both collectively and as individual contributors.

Proactive Collaboration. The integration and cross-disciplinary nature of Mainspring’s business requires intentionally seeking out others who bring different skills, perspectives, and priorities. Our culture of inclusion and respect extends beyond our team to interactions with our partners and customers.

More information can be found at www.mainspringenergy.com

Job Overview

At the heart of the Linear Generator is a piston and ring system that operates without any liquid lubricant.  This core innovation is foundational to our low emissions and critical to the O&M business model. The design of our solid lubricant sealing system is extremely complex and multiphysical –  involving intricate, 3D sliding interfaces, high pressure and temperature, materials optimization, fluid dynamics, heat transfer and structural mechanics. A successful candidate needs to be a fast learner, who can take on a leadership role and lead development projects, design parts and do hands-on work in the lab to analyze performance and failure modes.   This is an opportunity to take on a significant design challenge and make a core impact on the performance and reliability of our product.

• Lead ring development projects, including developing project requirements and scope, developing novel designs, reviewing in detail the designs and analyses of colleagues, and developing production introduction plans
• Design complex moving parts in the piston and ring system of the Linear Generator, from originating creative ideas, executing the design and build, testing and then evaluating performance
• Assess and root cause failure modes that involve complex thermal/structural/materials/fluids interactions, balancing analysis and hands-on physical intuition. 
• Design and run effective test campaigns, using both benchtop rigs and in-generator experiments to validate designs and accelerate learning.
• Collaborate closely with a talented engineering team in a fast-paced, iterative environment to find the best solutions.

• Masters in Mechanical Engineering or equivalent with at least ten years experience or PhD in Mechanical Engineering or equivalent with at least seven years experience
• Self-starter who thrives in an iterative, fast-paced dynamic environment and can lead projects and optimize solutions across different teams.
• Design experience with high performance parts that have been released into the market.  Relevant industries include Energy, Aerospace (especially turbomachinery and propulsion), and Oil & Gas
• Expert in SolidWorks or comparable CAD package, including structural FEA
• Excellent physical understanding of structural mechanics and heat transfer; strength in the following fields is a plus: tribology, fluids, materials
• Ability to generate 2D drawings for manufacturing, experience utilizing GD&T is preferred
• A proactive and collaborative work style suited for a dynamic R&D environment where priorities can evolve as you learn.

Does your experience not meet all of our posted requirements? Studies have shown that some people are less likely to apply to positions unless they meet every listed requirement. At Mainspring, we are committed to building a diverse, inclusive, flexible, and collaborative environment, so if you want to help us transition the world to clean and affordable electricity, and don’t meet all posted requirements for a particular role, we’d still love to hear from you. Mainspring can sometimes be flexible enough to shift responsibilities for the right person, or otherwise identify open or upcoming roles that may better fit your professional background.

In more traditional words, Mainspring Energy, Inc is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, or protected veteran status and will not be discriminated against on the basis of disability.

This compensation and benefits information is based on Mainspring Energy's estimate as of the date of publication and may be modified in the future. We generally do not negotiate on salary once we have made an offer. The level of pay within the range will depend on a variety of job-related factors that may include location, relevant prior experience and/or education, or particular skills and expertise. New hires joining the company tend to be paid within the starting base pay range noted above, with opportunities to increase pay over time based on development of additional skills, competencies, and company-specific knowledge.