Thermal Systems Engineer - EV Energy Management Systems

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In this position...

Ford Motor Company’s Electric Vehicle Engineering team is in the exciting and rapidly-advancing area of vehicle electrification. Our Electric Vehicle (EV) Energy Management Systems (EVEMS) organization is growing and is in search of outstanding individuals to help shape the direction of our next generation electric powertrains. Successful applicants will work closely with various electrification departments to lead the development of vehicle products, architectures, and requirements for forthcoming products while assessing cutting edge technologies to support deployment of a best-in-industry electrified vehicle product portfolio.

At Ford Motor Company, we are dedicated to designing, manufacturing and selling high quality vehicles that meet the diverse needs of our customers. We believe our employees and the different perspectives that they bring to the business are the driving force behind our success. Come discover a company that is focused on the quality of our vehicles, the environment, the community and the world in which we live.

This engineering position within EVEMS will concentrate on vehicle level systems engineering to maximize thermal energy efficiency to enhance vehicle range (both on-cycle per EPA and on-road for customer driving). The critical system interfaces are with propulsion and cabin climate control.

 

 

What you'll do...

• Conduct analysis for minimizing thermal energy consumption for both regulatory drive cycles and on-road driving for full operational ambient temperature range. Methods include improving heat sharing across subsystems, minimizing parasitic demands such as pumps and fan, minimizing losses to ambient, minimizing climate control energy. Communicate results to management regarding implementation on vehicle programs.
• Conduct vehicle testing (on-road at proving grounds or in laboratory settings) to develop improvements for thermal system efficiency. Compare with analytical results, prior engineering sign-off engineering reports, and existing analytical methods with sound engineering judgement. Develop instrumentation plan (thermocouples, flow meters, pressure transducers, module data streams) for data collection through testing with calibrators and/or in wind tunnel with prototype vehicles for attribute assessment.
• Measure energy consumption of thermal devices during regulatory drive cycles such as CTTP and SC03. Determine effect of thermal design actions on calculated derate factor for EPA estimated range. Assist engineering teams in Europe with WLTP and China with CLTC analysis.
• Provide value assessments for design actions that affect the thermal system of the vehicle. With cost pressures for hardware, determine most effective thermal countermeasures to maximize range yet minimize impact on high value customer attributes.  Calculate range benefit and cost of ownership for thermal design actions that affect energy consumption.
• Provide guidance to CAE modeling teams for how to best represent energy consumption and overall thermal efficiency of subsystems.
• Regularly interface with software controls and calibration engineers to identify opportunities for improving thermal system efficiency. Methods may require addition of sensors, improving calculated inferences, and system optimization. Evaluate interactions of cooling fan, active grill shutters, heat pump, cabin heating and cooling, battery heating and cooling, electro-drive unit warming and cooling.
• Support program engineers who develop energy efficient vehicle thermal system solutions according to program timing fulfilling the functional requirements of the propulsion system and includes full integration with climate control.
• Assist hardware design and release engineers and Program Management with understanding of how to optimize hardware selection for cost and energy efficiency.
• Mine data from of competitive benchmarked vehicles, prior vehicle analytical, development, and sign-off testing to ensure inputs and system interactions are aligned with expectations.
• Provide regular status reports to management for projects supporting energy efficiency.

You'll have...

• B.S. in Engineering or related field
• Passion for the development and advancement of efficient electrified vehicle technology
• ≥ 5 years’ experience with Automotive or Systems Engineering concepts and processes
• ≥ 5 years demonstrated experience working with cross functional teams and driving product development issues to resolution
• ≥ 5 years’ experience communicating technical information concisely