Capacitor Manufacturing Engineer

About the Role

Fuse is establishing a dedicated in-house manufacturing facility for high-voltage pulsed-power capacitors. The program requires production of hundreds of thousands of 40-160 nF, 100 kV double-ended capacitors, previously produced only by a handful of specialized manufacturers worldwide. As the Capacitor Manufacturing Engineer, you'll bring deep hands-on expertise in high-voltage film capacitor fabrication to commission, qualify, and operate this facility from the ground up - a founding engineering role with direct impact on the core pulsed-power infrastructure.

Core Responsibilities

Facility Setup & Process Engineering

• Lead the setup and commissioning of the capacitor manufacturing facility, including procurement and qualification of winding, impregnation, encapsulation, and high-voltage test equipment.
• Establish the manufacturing process from raw film through finished, tested capacitor.

Film Winding & Dielectric Stack Assembly

• Develop and optimize winding parameters for metallized polypropylene (PP) film or film/foil electrode systems for high-voltage, low-inductance pulse applications.
• Define winding tension, layer counts, geometry, and metallization strategies to improve performance and service life.

Vacuum Impregnation & Encapsulation

• Develop and qualify vacuum pressure impregnation (VPI) and encapsulation processes to eliminate voids, suppress partial discharge, and maximize dielectric strength.
• Ensure terminal integration and mechanical robustness under repetitive discharge stress.

High-Voltage Testing & Quality Control

• Establish production acceptance testing, including capacitance, dissipation factor (tan), DC hipot, partial discharge, and pulse discharge life testing.
• Build quality controls and statistical process tracking to improve yield and identify failure modes as production scales.

Materials & Supply Chain

• Qualify suppliers and establish material standards for dielectric film, metallization, electrodes, impregnants, and capacitor hardware.
• Evaluate alternative materials and processes that could improve energy density, reliability, or temperature performance.

Continuous Improvement & Scale-Up

• Drive the transition from pilot production to high-volume manufacturing.
• Implement automation across winding, testing, and packaging to improve yield, throughput, and unit cost.

Minimum Qualifications

• B.Sc. or M.Sc. in Electrical Engineering, Materials Science, Physics, Manufacturing/Process Engineering, or a related field.
• 2+ years of hands-on experience in high-voltage film capacitor manufacturing, including winding, impregnation, encapsulation, and high-voltage testing.
• Deep knowledge of polypropylene film dielectrics, metallization processes, and partial discharge physics at high field strengths.
• Demonstrated experience with vacuum pressure impregnation (VPI) systems and epoxy/resin process chemistry.
• Proficiency in high-voltage test methods, including capacitance bridge, tan, DC hipot, and partial discharge measurement (IEC 60270).
• Experience establishing or managing a manufacturing quality system (ISO 9001 or equivalent) for electrical components.

Preferred Qualifications

• Prior experience at a pulsed-power capacitor manufacturer.
• Familiarity with double-ended low-inductance capacitor architectures designed for pulse-discharge applications.
• Experience with automated winding-machine programming and mechanical setup, including mandrel, tension control, and traversing.
• Knowledge of capacitor life modeling under repetitive pulse stress, including voltage reversal, peak current, and dI/dt.
• Familiarity with dielectric film casting or metallization processes is a strong plus.

What We Value

• Give a shit. Build things you're proud of.
• Take responsibility. If something is broken and you can fix it, fix it. See things through.
• Move fast. Make decisions, learn quickly, and keep moving forward.
• Think bigger. Simplify relentlessly. Don't default to the safe answer.
• Disagree and commit. The best idea wins. Once a decision is made, we move.
• Desire to win. This is hard. Expect intensity. We are here to win.
• Plan B is to make Plan A work.

Benefits

• Medical, dental, and vision coverage.
• Relocation assistance for roles that require it.
• Flexible time off. Take what you need, no accrual tracking.
• 2 weeks of paid time off built into the end of each year, subject to team and business needs.
• Supportive leave of absence policies.
• Paid leave for new parents.

Itar Requirements

To conform to U.S. Government technology export regulations, including the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), you must be a U.S. citizen, lawful permanent resident of the U.S., protected individual as defined by 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3), or eligible to obtain the required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State.