About this job

Sapienza Consulting, a Serco company, is recruiting a Materials and Processes Laboratory Technician for Sapienza to work on our Customers Site (ESA-ESTEC).

Sapienza has been a partner of ESA for almost 30 years, and we pride ourselves in supporting a wide range of missions including Galileo, MTG, Copernicus and ExoMars. Our team is international with activities across the U.K., the Netherlands, North Macedonia, Belgium, Luxembourg, France, Germany, Italy and Spain.

Responsibilities

• In collaboration and support of the Metallic and Non-Metallic Materials and Processes as well as Evaluation Engineer, assess customers’ needs in relation to laboratory/analysis activities.
• Perform all measurements and analyses on metallic as well as non-metallic materials (including cleanliness and contamination control related activities as well as PCBs and electronic assembly) on a variety of destructive and non-destructive test equipment/tools. This includes also the issuing of dedicated testing procedures and documentation development as well as inclusion of test requests and test results in the relevant quality management systems and databases.
• To set up and operate equipment/analysis tools devoted to the assessment of space environmental effects. This includes assessment by simulating the space environment (vacuum, radiation, ATOX, contamination, thermal ….) as well as pre/post characterisation by analytical techniques (thermal analysis, chemical analysis, physical and microscopic analysis, surface analysis, spectroscopic analysis, NDI techniques etc.)Use a variety of laboratory tools, including acoustic microscopy, optical microscopy scanning microscopy, confocal microscopy, XRD, X-Ray imaging, NDI etc., XPS, surface tension, Auger Microscopy, Raman Spectroscopy, Atomic Force Microscopy, IST Testing.
• Perform mechanical and thermo-mechanical testing (including static, fatigue, fatigue crack propagation, Nano indentation, Nano scratch, low speed impact, hardness testing), also using contact and contact less in-situ strain measurement systems (strain gauges/ARAMIS).
• Perform all thermal analysis on materials (including thermo-gravimetric, differential scanning calorimetry, thermo-mechanical as well as dynamic mechanical analysis, dielectric analysis, CTE determination, thermal diffusivity/conductivity analysis as well as coupled and advanced thermal modelling techniques for physico-chemical analysis.
• Perform all corrosion characterisation testing, including but not limited to stress-corrosion, galvanic, red-plague, general corrosion, humidity/salt fog testing, etc.
• Perform all verification activities on Printed Circuit Boards and electronics assemblies.
• Recording sample properties or condition during and after test, accurately and legibly.
• Draft relevant test reports for all performed test activities.
• Checking on test equipment performance and reporting any anomalies or faults.
• Improving test procedures and ensuring that these are executed correctly.
• Maintenance of the relevant test equipment, ensuring that the equipment under his/her responsibility is kept in an operational state and all necessary routine calibration and maintenance activities are performed.

Profile

• Bachelor’s degree or equivalent from a recognized institution.
• 4 years of professional experience.
• Strong hands-on experience in non-destructive investigation such as X-ray tomography, X-ray diffraction, Acoustic inspection.
• Hands-on experience in optical and electron microscopy.
• Experience in metallurgical sample preparation for failure investigations and root cause analysis.
• Experience in test execution according to recognized standards and equipment maintenance and troubleshooting.
• Strong background in materials engineering, including metallurgy and hands-on laboratory experience.
• Strong hands-on experience in optical and scanning electron microscopy including interpretation of EDX and EBSD.
• Hands-on experience with equipment maintenance and troubleshooting.
• Experience in non-destructive investigation.
• Strong experience in metallurgical sample preparation for failure investigations and root cause analysis.
• Experience in test execution according to recognized standards and equipment maintenance and troubleshooting.
• Strong background in materials engineering, including metallurgy and hands-on laboratory experience.
• Comfortable with working in a diverse and multinational team environment.
• Excellent interpersonal skills are needed, together with a high degree organizational and communication abilities.
• Proficient in the English language, both written and spoken.
• Knowledge of another EU member state language is an asset.
• Candidates must be eligible to work in the EU.