Senior Materials Engineer

Overview

The Materials Technology team at ZF is a specialist group with broad expertise in materials analysis, particularly electronics, supporting multiple divisions alongside the Friedrichshafen Materials Lab and external customers and suppliers across the UK. This Senior Materials Engineer will lead failure evaluation and materials investigations, coordinate local lab testing against global standards, and provide engineering consultancy across a wide range of material technologies and testing methods.

Key Responsibilities

• Advise, arrange and coordinate investigative processes for failure evaluation, including interpretation of results, reporting findings, and implementation of corrective actions
• Provide engineering and consultancy services on materials and related production processes, including teardown of components and laboratory testing
• Support development and implementation of lab policies and procedures, ensuring compliance with ISO/IEC Quality, EHS and 5S requirements
• Coordinate purchasing of lab needs within budget constraints and support cost estimation for current and future lab requirements
• Collaborate with the Friedrichshafen Materials Lab to optimise lab efficiency and balance regional testing capacity
• Perform teardown of mechanical assemblies, precise sectioning and metallographic preparation to a high standard of accuracy
• Apply materials lab analytical and testing techniques to support routine and complex customer requests
• Liaise with regional and global Engineering and Quality functions, generate detailed lab reports, and attend customer meetings as required

Requirements

Essential: bachelor’s degree in Materials, Chemical or Mechanical Engineering, or a comparable field; around 5 years’ professional experience in testing or quality organisations, preferably automotive, including hands-on laboratory testing; familiarity with test specifications of major OEMs and international standards (ISO, IEC, DIN); strong knowledge of metals, including casting, forging, sheet steel and welding, with practical metallographic technique experience and failure analysis capability; hands-on experience with Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM-EDX) and other non-destructive methods such as X-ray and FTIR; proven ability to manage and lead multiple projects and priorities; solid understanding of budgeting, including developing business cases for operational and capital requirements; business-fluent English, written and spoken; willingness for limited local and international travel.

Desirable: basic knowledge of PCB assemblies and electronic materials, with training provided as needed; German language skills.