Principal UAS Guidance Navigation Control (GNC) Engineer

Knightwerx is looking for a highly skilled and experienced Principal GNC Engineer to work on the development of a small unmanned electric aircraft. We operate in a fast-paced development environment that balances innovation and ingenuity with practicality and reliability. You’ll be working and supported by a team of strong engineers and subject matter experts to develop an aircraft from the ground up and be involved in every step of the process.

Work Experience

·       Bachelor's or higher degree in relevant engineering discipline

·       Min. 8-12 years GNC experience developing software for embedded systems

·       Top to bottom, start to finish development of embedded system

·       Cross-discipline, hands-on experience with electrical, embedded, and software fields

Attributes

·       Innovative, hands-on, and practical

·       Multi-disciplined, problem solver, driven by engineering analysis

·       Goal driven, learns from mistakes, and closes the loop on the design process

·       Understands trades of scope for effort

·       Communicates well through discussion and documentation

·       Works well with others to develop plans and solve problems

Primary Duties

·       Focus on the adaptation and development of onboard flight control system for a small UAS

·       Works with cross-discipline engineers (AE, ME, EE, SW) to understand the system-level desired functionality and translates to software requirements

·       Works with aircraft designer to size and spatially configure control actuators; define and experimentally confirm control authority requirements

·       Architects, implements and tunes vehicle and component control loops, and state estimation algorithms

·       Work with SW team to build and implement 6-DOF software in the loop simulator

·       Work with AE team to build 6-DOF vehicle model for simulation

·       Aide in evaluating and defining tasking/effort to fit the schedule and scope of the project in conjunction with project management

Tasks

·       State estimation algorithm implementation and tuning

·       Architect/modify vehicle control loops

·       Verify/tune vehicle and component control loops

·       Develop vehicle and component-level models

·       Research, down-select, and source vehicle sensors and computational components

·       Help roadmap GPS-denied / VIO implementation into vehicle

Skills

·       Understanding of common state estimation algorithms and methods for assessing/tuning

·       Understanding of common control loops and methods for assessing/tuning

·       Embedded programming, with emphasis on C/C in a robotics and/or UAV setting. Experience with Python, C# (desired)

·       Basic understanding of low-level avionics hardware

·       Capable of hardware debugging and/or working with hardware engineers to troubleshoot avionics issues Includes following wiring diagrams and oscilloscope/analyzer use

·       Physics-based actuator/vehicle modeling

·       Experience with Ardupilot and/or PX4 code bases and compatible hardware (desired)

Requirements

·       Must have US citizenship

·       On-site, collaborative work environment

About Knightwerx

Knightwerx is a start-up company that was born to be game-changing. From its inception, Knightwerx has focused on solving real-world, mission-critical problems for the government and civilian sectors. Our approach is to seek top experts for every position who are not only willing to make a lasting impact but to drive innovation and enhance the company’s direction. As such, we are not business leaders who build drones or drone builders running a business. We are both.