Job DescriptionThe Senior Hot Section Durability Engineer is a technical leader responsible for ensuring combustor and turbine gas-path components meet time-on-wing, repairability, and Hot Section Refurbishment Interval (HSRI) requirements while maintaining performance, fuel efficiency, manufacturability, and cost goals. This role spans the full product life cycle-from early concept design and optimization through development engine testing, certification, field support, and aftermarket engineering.
Hot Section Durability Engineers design and assess advanced high-temperature hardware such as turbine airfoils, blade outer air seals (BOAS), combustor liner panels, and cast heat exchangers.
Key Responsibilities- Lead durability strategy for turbine and combustor components, ensuring compliance with time-on-wing, repairability, and HSRI targets.
- Responsible for design and assessment of turbine airfoils, BOAS, combustor liners including internal cooling schemes, film cooling technologies, thermal barrier coatings, and advanced materials.
- Develop and execute analyses of varying complexity, including:
- Mechanical, time-dependent damage predictions (creep, oxidation, TBC spallation, TMF).
- Full conjugate heat transfer (CHT) and coupled aerothermal-structural simulations.
- Reduced-order empirical models and 1D thermal models for rapid design iteration.
- Evaluate the durability impact of complex internal cores, cooling geometries, and advanced manufacturing processes.
- Conduct and lead root-cause investigations using new, returned, and repaired hardware to understand field performance, distress progression, and failure mechanisms.
- Provide technical leadership in design reviews, safety boards, and program milestones; mentor junior engineers on durability methods and best practices.
- Support manufacturing and supply chain by understanding process capabilities, anticipated variability, and implications for durability and quality.
- Develop and refine internal tools, models, and methodologies to accelerate durability assessments and improve prediction fidelity.
Required Technical Expertise- Deep understanding of fluid mechanics and heat transfer, including convection, conduction, radiation, and aerothermal loads on hot-section components.
- Strong knowledge of material properties and high-temperature distress mechanisms, including:
- Thermal barrier coating (TBC) spallation
- Bond coat and substrate oxidation
- Airfoil creep
- Thermomechanical fatigue (TMF), LCF/HCF interactions
- Familiarity with manufacturing processes and their variability, including:
- Core die tooling and internal passage formation
- Investment casting of superalloys
- Advanced coating systems
- Cooling hole drilling and finishing processes
- Ability to model durability impacts of environmental and mission factors, such as sand ingestion, corrosion, and high-cycle thermal transients.
- Proficiency with finite element analysis (FEA) and heat transfer tools; experience with conjugate analyses and coupled physics is preferred.
- Experience with commercial FEA software (e.g., ANSYS Structural and Thermal Analysis using both Workbench AND ADPL) and life analysis codes.
- Hand on Experience in using CAD tools like NX or Creo;
- Pogramming capabilities in Python and MatLab, or the equivalent;
Qualifications- Bachelor's degree in Aerospace Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Materials Science, or related field; Master's or PhD strongly preferred.
- 12+ years of experience in hot-section turbine, combustor, or high-temperature component durability.
- Demonstrated ability to lead complex durability analyses, investigations, and cross-functional decision making.
- Strong communication skills with the ability to influence design, manufacturing, and program leadership.
- U.S. citizenship is required due to the nature of defense contracts.
