Sr. Harness Engineer

Department: Vehicle Engineering

Location: Hawthorne, California

Compensation: $169,000 - $187,000 / year

Description Venturi Astrolab, Inc. (Astrolab) is pioneering new ways to explore and operate on distant planetary bodies. We are singularly focused on designing, building, and operating a fleet of multi-purpose commercial planetary rovers to extend and enhance humanity’s presence in the solar system. We are seeking motivated, creative, and exceptional people to join our world-class team.

As a Harness Design Engineer, you'll own the design and execution of flight, GSE, and test harnesses that connect avionics, sensors, power systems, and vehicle subsystems—ensuring reliability in extreme environments.

This is an end-to-end role spanning requirements definition, architecture, detailed design, first-article builds, qualification testing, and production support. You will work closely with mechanical, thermal, electrical, integration, and manufacturing teams to deliver harness systems that are safe, lightweight, manufacturable, and flight-ready.

We are looking for a hands-on, highly collaborative engineer who thrives in fast-paced environments and is excited to build real flight hardware. You’ll be a key technical owner on the vehicle program with high visibility and the ability to shape best practices as the organization scales.

What you'll do:

• Coordinate with Avionics Engineers to define and manage system level harness schematics for flight hardware, test, and GSE assets.
• Identify and maintain a library aerospace-grade materials, including connectors, backshells, shielding, wires, and cables for signal, power, data, and RF.
• Use 3D CAD tools to design routed harness models, ensuring proper physical architecture based on aerospace standards for bend radii, strain relief, retention, isolation, and separation, within complex vehicle assemblies.
• Create 2D flat harness drawings and formboards for production. Support first-article builds and resolve manufacturing non-conformances.
• Perform essential analyses such as voltage drop, current derating, and EMI/EMC shielding effectiveness and resolve designs to defined standards. Coordinate qualification tests like continuity, isolation, and vibration/thermal cycling.

What you'll bring: Basic Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, or a closely related technical field
• 5+ years of professional experience in wire harness design, including experience creating and interpreting wiring diagrams, schematics, and interface documentation
• Experience using CAD and PLM systems to develop and release production drawings, with an understanding of harness design and manufacturing considerations
• Experience troubleshooting wire harness issues and supporting design solutions through root cause analysis and corrective action

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience supporting aerospace, launch vehicle, defense, robotics, automotive, or other complex technical applications
• Experience with aerospace-grade materials and components, including considerations for weight, cost, manufacturability, inspection, testability, and rework
• Experience with relevant industry standards, such as IPC/WHMA-A-620, NASA-STD-8739.4, NASA-STD-8739.6, NASA-STD-6016, SAE AS22759, or J-STD-001
• Experience designing for high vibration, vacuum, thermal cycling, or electromagnetic interference (EMI) environments
• Experience with harness-level or system-level signal integrity analysis for high-speed data interfaces, such as Ethernet, SpaceWire, or LVDS
• Experience with Siemens NX and Teamcenter
• Experience with harness-specific design tools such as E3 Zuken

Benefits and Perks

• Join a team of best-in-class engineers building the foundation of planetary surface exploration
• Equity ownership in the company
• Comprehensive health benefits, including medical, dental, vision, and mental health support
• 401(k) plan with company match
• Flexible PTO and parental leave
• Home office set up reimbursement
• Weekly lunch stipend, plus complimentary snacks and beverages on-site
• Once a month social hour on-site with food and drinks