About You
As a Graduate Mechanical Engineer, you will take full ownership of mechanical subsystems for our particle accelerator and target station hardware, carrying each project through design, analysis, manufacture, test and integration.
You think in CAD and calculations first, but you don't stop at the drawing board - when a design needs proving out, you're just as happy on the shop floor, machining a part or brazing a joint yourself to get it right.
You are a generalist by nature, happy to move across the whole system rather than settle into one narrow piece of it, and you move with a sense of urgency, favouring building and testing over waiting for formal sign-off.
About StandardX
There is infrastructure that defines eras. The steam engine made the industrial world possible. The internet created an economy. StandardX is building the next one.
Some of the most essential materials on Earth are also the rarest. Isotopes are the invisible backbone of modern life - curing cancer, keeping industrial systems resilient and fuelling the fusion reactors that will power the next century. Yet the infrastructure that produces them is ageing, fragmented and increasingly unable to keep up with demand.
We're a world-class team of nuclear engineers, deep tech operators and doctoral-level scientists building the UK's first isotope refinery: a single proprietary platform, deployable anywhere, producing the full portfolio of critical isotopes at scale - turning chronic scarcity into abundance.
Exceptional team. Massive problem. If you want to work on something that matters, really matters, this is it.
Key Objectives
- Take full ownership of mechanical subsystems, from concept through design, analysis, manufacture, test and integration.
- Develop hardware for particle accelerator and target station systems, including vacuum vessels, precision alignment systems and support structures.
- Build and maintain the tooling that supports in-house manufacturing and integration.
- Move quickly and pragmatically, avoiding analysis paralysis and unnecessary process gates.
Your Responsibilities
1️⃣ Mechanical Design & Ownership
- Act as a Responsible Engineer with full ownership of your projects through design, analysis, manufacture, test and integration
- Develop mechanical subsystems for particle accelerator and/or target stations, including:
- Vacuum vessels
- Precision alignment systems for electromagnets and RF cavities
- Vacuum stages for diagnostics
- Support structures
- Facility radiation shielding
- Brackets to support pipes and/or electrical cabling
2️⃣ Analysis & Validation
- Perform static structural FEA and validate models against physical test results
- Interpret and create mechanical drawings using GD&T, including tolerance stack-up analysis
3️⃣ Hands-On Fabrication
- Machine your own parts on a mill or lathe
- Design and build tooling to support in-house manufacturing and integration
- Work confidently across manufacturing processes such as CNC, sheet metal, welding and brazing
4️⃣ Speed & Pragmatism
- Move fast without waiting for formal readiness gates or excess process
- Operate as a generalist across the full system rather than staying narrowly specialised
Requirements
- Recent graduate with hands-on experience designing, building and testing hardware (e.g. Formula Student, competitive university team, or startup experience)
- 1+ years of CAD experience with OnShape, SolidWorks, Fusion 360, NX, Catia, Creo, or similar
- Experience with static structural FEA, including validating the model against physical test
- Experience machining your own parts on a mill or lathe
- Comfortable in a workshop with common hand tools and power tools
- Full-time availability before the end of August
- Willingness to work on-site in London
Ideal Experience
- Experience interpreting and creating mechanical drawings with GD&T and performing tolerance stack-up analysis
- Experience creating shell models in FEMAP
- Knowledge of UHV systems - vacuum pump types and trade-offs, UHV interfaces and design rules
- Experience writing safety margin tables
Benefits
Private Health Cover, with the option to add dependants.
️ Life Assurance (Death in Service) at 4x salary.
Salary sacrifice pension, with 4% employer contribution.
Cycle to Work Scheme.
EMI Share Options.
