Principle Design Engineer

Northampton Business Directory; Daventry; Hybrid; GBP 50,000 - 70,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading aerospace interiors firm in Daventry is seeking an experienced Principle Design Engineer to lead a mechanical engineering team. This role involves overseeing product development for aerospace interior components, fulfilling customer requirements, and ensuring compliance with engineering standards. Candidates should possess proven mechanical design experience, ideally with software like CATIA or SolidWorks, and leadership skills. The position offers a permanent opportunity, with one day of remote working available.

Qualifications

• Proven leadership experience in managing engineering teams.
• Confident in Mechanical Design with software like Catia or SolidWorks.
• Experience working with aircraft or vehicle interiors.

Responsibilities

• Lead and manage a team of Mechanical Engineers with technical direction.
• Oversee full lifecycle product development for aerospace interior components.
• Serve as primary engineering interface with customers.

Skills

Leadership experience

Mechanical Design

Experience in interiors

Tools

CATIA V5

SolidWorks

Siemens NX

Job description

Are you a Principle Design Engineer? Do you have experience working with aircraft/vehicle interior design? Are you confident leading a team of mechanical engineers providing technical direction and workload prioritization? If so a global leader in interiors is currently looking to grow their mechanical team with a Principle Design Engineer!

Principle Design Engineer

Permanent Opportunity

7:30-4 Mon-Thurs, 7:30-1:00 Fridays

1 day remote working available Northampton

Responsibilities will include:

• Lead and manage a team of Mechanical Engineers, providing technical direction, coaching, workload prioritization, and ensuring high-quality engineering output
• Oversee full lifecycle product development for aerospace interior components—from trade studies, DFMEA/PFMEA execution, concept generation, detailed design, and prototyping through to testing, certification support, and production release.
• Serve as the primary engineering interface with customers, driving requirements definition, technical reviews, design trade-offs, and aftermarket support to ensure solutions meet performance, cost, manufacturability, and regulatory expectations.
• Drive disciplined engineering processes including GD&T, robust documentation within PLM systems (SmartTeam, Teamcenter), utilising CAD tools such as CATIA V5, Siemens NX, or SolidWorks for high-integrity design outputs.
• Specify and validate materials—including metals, reinforced composites, plastics, and fabrics—ensuring design compliance with aerospace standards, manufacturability constraints, and long‑term product reliability.

Essential Skills and Experience:

• Proven leadership experience
• Confident in Mechanical Design having used Catia (will consider other software experienced e.g. Solidworks, NX)
• Experience working with interiors