Business Title: Senior Electrical Engineer
Reports to: Senior Engineering Manager
Leadership Scope: Individual Contributor
Position Summary: The Senior Electrical Engineer is responsible for the design, development, validation, and support of automotive headlamp and signal lamp systems for OEM customers in the heavy-duty market. This role leads electrical design activities, supports cross-functional teams, and ensures products meet regulatory, customer, performance, durability, quality, manufacturing, and cost requirements while mentoring less-experienced engineers.
Position Duties:
- Working with project team members to understand/develop requirements and to develop new or improved lamp concepts/designs satisfying regulatory and customer performance, durability, and quality requirements along with meeting internal manufacturing process requirements and cost targets.
- Developing the design of electrical systems and components for lamps including primary responsibility for electrical system architecture, PCBA schematics, and component / PCB material selection and directing/reviewing the development of the PCB keep-outs and layouts, harnesses, and embedded software.
- Leading the development/review of drawings for all PCBAs, harnesses, and relevant electrical sub-assemblies ensuring the proper use of GD&T and linear dimensioning/tolerancing as appropriate, that all critical features are defined, that all relevant specifications are noted, completeness and accuracy, etc.
- Supporting/performing tolerance stack-up analysis using statistical methods as appropriate.
- Completing PCBA circuit simulations and coordinating/reviewing thermal FEA/CFD simulations.
- Performing and/or coordinating testing of lamps and components to ensure designs meet all electrical and thermal requirements, including ESD, voltage transients, EMI/EMC emissions/immunity, over/reverse voltage, etc.
- Developing/improving and documenting design, simulation, and testing standards related to all aspects of lamp electrical design.
- Researching, interpreting, and applying relevant regulatory requirements and industry standards including FMVSS 108, UN Regulations (R10 and R148-R150), SAE Lighting Systems Group standards, and those from IEC, IPC, CISPR, ISO, etc.
- Working with the Manufacturing and Quality teams to troubleshoot and resolve issues related to manufacturing processes and quality controls.
- Working with the Purchasing team in the sourcing of purchased components and validation of suppliers and ensuring that purchased components are properly designed/spec'd to conform to industry standards, minimize cost, and maximize supply chain flexibility.
- Working with the Sales team in the quoting of new or revised business and customer management including the estimation of part and capital costs.
- Mentoring other engineers and team members in all aspects, and electrical aspects in particular, of lamp quoting, design, manufacturing, validation, etc.
Requirements: The ideal candidate will have a Bachelor degree or higher in Electrical or Electronics Engineering or a related technical field and extensive (3-5+ years) electrical engineering design experience in automotive headlamps and/or signal lamps including familiarity with relevant optical and/or mechanical engineering design principles, along with experience with the manufacturing processes relevant to automotive lighting and PCBs/PCBAs, such as surface mount and through hole PCB assembly, PCB fabrication, PCBA testing/programming, harness assembly, terminal crimping, lamp assembly, etc. Good documentation, communication, and teamwork are essential. Specific relevant skills/experience are listed below:
- Switch-mode and/or linear power supply design, specifically constant current applications
- Design of/for mixed-signal electronics, analog circuit protection, electromagnetic emissions and immunity, ESD, signal and power integrity
- Familiarity with PCB layout principles and usage of common PCB materials, including FR4 and Al metal core, and finishes, including ENIG and HASL
- Circuit simulation in LT Spice or similar
- Wiring harness design
- Experience in Altium Designer / Altium 365
- SAE J1939, ISO 11898, or other CAN/LIN protocols
- Board-level communication protocols like UART, I2C, and SPI
- Embedded software development
- Creo CAD exposure is optimal, followed by Catia or NX and then other systems
- Performing and/or coordinating/reviewing the listed simulations/analyses utilizing the listed or similar software:
- Thermal FEA utilizing Ansys Mechanical / CFD utilizing FloEFD
- Part measurement and dimensional analysis utilizing PolyWorks
- Intermediate GD&T application and tolerance stack-up analysis
Research, review, interpretation, and application of relevant regulatory requirements and industry standards, specifically in relation to FMVSS 108, UN Regulations (R148-R150), and the SAE Lighting Systems Group
