Updated January 15
, 2023 from Seattle, WA.
What I’m doing now.
Building Rocket Engines. Working alongside a strong team, together we are building the machines, the engines, that will propel humanity into the future — amongst the stars. I am part of the Blue Origin family – an enthusiastic team of people that builds the next generation of space-flight technology. We build the engines and the vehicles, the spaceships, that will build a road to space for the betterment of humanity. We are also relentlessly pursuing lunar permanence efforts, of which someday I will be part of – I will go to the moon someday – to inspire the next generation – with effort, amazing things are possible.
I live in Seattle, Washington.
See related LinkedIn post here.
Update from March 28, 2022 from West Texas.
Finishing my “Calypte” drone. Named after a species of hummingbird, I am building a drone using COTS (commercial off the shelf) material for the mission of performing videography. While I know there are plenty of drones out in the market that can do this, what would be the fun in simply purchasing one?
Why videography? – Because this world is awesome, and we need some more bird’s eye video to capture the beauty of it all.
Also, a requirement for this drone is to have the ability to be programmed to fly autonomously (!).
Freelance engineering. First, I should state one important lesson I’ve learned during my nearly two years of freelance work: narrow your focus. Contract work grants freelancers with the freedom to choose their projects, but to serve your customers with a high level of quality and integrity, you must have a higher-level goal. In other words, you should be able to answer the question: what is my mission? For me, my mission is to contribute to the development of next-generation flight vehicles by applying manufacturing technologies, engineering design, aerodynamic fundamentals, control theory, and flight intuition. A mission has given me the focus I need to only take-on exploratory projects that will, in some form, allow me to make the leap from a mission idea to compelling accomplishments. With that said, I’ve taken on several start-up projects, ranging from mechanical engineering design – such as, designing a speed-reducing gearbox for generator applications, to developing manufacturing quality assurance tools by applying deep learning neural networks and computer vision for in-situ defect detection. These projects have given me the opportunity to apply design for manufacturing (DFM) principles while brushing up on GD&T (Geometric Dimensioning and Tolerance), and developing my machine learning engineering skills – some necessary skills to the development of future flight vehicles. Freelance work has given me an even greater gift than the opportunity to pick and choose projects that serve my higher purpose, it has forced me to listen to my customer’s needs, something which didn’t quite come naturally to me.
P.S. I highly recommend reading So Good They Can’t Ignore You by Cal Newport for more thoughts on living a “Mission Driven Life”
Teaching undergraduate engineering courses. I’m teaching courses online (traditional in person pre-COVID), I have found that sharing knowledge and helping others develop skills is extremely rewarding. On a more selfish note, working with students so closely, I get exposed to how students limit themselves and at times self-sabotage, this has allowed me to see “above myself”; I am now much more attuned to when my character and attitude needs adjustment (What a gift!). Also, having the opportunity to teach fundamental engineering courses such as, statics and mechanics of materials, design of experiments, engineering mathematics, and data science, really reinforces the fundamentals!
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