Senior Mechanical Design Engineer – Liquid Cooling Systems

Armada is a company building modular edge AI infrastructure and data center platforms. The Senior Mechanical Systems / Design Engineer will lead the architecture, design, integration, documentation, manufacturing readiness, controls integration, and commissioning of liquid cooling and mechanical distribution systems for modular AI data centers.

Responsibilities:

• Own the end-to-end mechanical cooling and fluid-distribution architecture for modular data center platforms
• Define primary, secondary, and rack-level cooling boundaries
• Establish pumping, flow-control, pressure-management, balancing, and redundancy strategies
• Align heat-rejection equipment, distribution piping, CDUs, rack manifolds, rear-door heat exchangers, and other cooling interfaces
• Develop scalable architectures that support multiple product configurations and deployment sizes
• Perform and review pipe-sizing, flow, pressure-drop, pump-head, and system-volume calculations
• Develop hydraulic models for water and glycol-based systems
• Account for fluid concentration, viscosity, temperature, fittings, valves, strainers, heat exchangers, and equipment pressure losses
• Define control-valve, balancing-valve, bypass, minimum-flow, and differential-pressure strategies
• Validate system performance across normal, part-load, maintenance, startup, and failure conditions
• Own P&IDs, mechanical schematics, equipment schedules, valve schedules, instrumentation schedules, and design calculations
• Develop mechanical design criteria, basis-of-design requirements, and standard details
• Define clear equipment and scope boundaries between plant systems, modules, CDUs, rack cooling, and field interconnections
• Maintain disciplined revision control and technical traceability across the mechanical design package
• Review vendor drawings, submittals, calculations, and equipment selections for compliance with system intent
• Define mechanical interfaces between factory-built modules and field-installed infrastructure
• Develop repeatable interconnect strategies for supply and return piping, manifolds, flexible connections, isolation valves, quick disconnects, drains, vents, and leak detection
• Establish labeling, connection, access, and installation standards that reduce field variability
• Support product configurations designed for transport, rapid installation, and phased expansion
• Develop layouts that support repeatable fabrication, assembly, inspection, testing, and installation
• Standardize piping routes, fittings, valve assemblies, supports, connection points, and mechanical components where practical
• Coordinate equipment clearances, removal paths, service access, drain points, vent points, and filter or strainer access
• Partner with manufacturing teams to resolve buildability issues and improve future revisions
• Translate field and factory feedback into product improvements
• Define the mechanical measurement and control requirements for temperature, flow, differential pressure, pressure, leak detection, fluid level, pump status, and valve position
• Partner with controls engineers to develop system operating sequences and alarm strategies
• Support pump staging, variable-speed control, minimum-flow protection, equipment enablement, and failure-response logic
• Help ensure mechanical system data is available for commissioning, operations, and remote monitoring
• Design systems for safe and efficient filling, flushing, venting, draining, testing, balancing, and startup
• Define isolation, bypass, temporary connection, and load-bank testing requirements
• Develop or support factory acceptance, site acceptance, and integrated systems testing procedures
• Establish performance-verification criteria for flow, pressure, temperature, heat rejection, controls, alarms, and failure modes
• Work directly with commissioning and field teams during startup and troubleshooting
• Partner with thermal, electrical, controls, structural, manufacturing, commissioning, supply chain, and product teams
• Coordinate directly with OEMs, equipment manufacturers, fabricators, and engineering partners
• Identify interface risks, design gaps, and single points of failure early
• Make clear technical decisions while maintaining alignment across the broader product architecture
• Communicate complex system behavior in a practical way to both technical and nontechnical stakeholders

Requirements:

• 7 or more years of experience designing mechanical cooling, hydraulic distribution, process cooling, or mission-critical infrastructure systems
• Experience with data centers, semiconductor facilities, industrial process cooling, central utility plants, or comparable high-reliability environments
• Strong knowledge of pipe sizing, pump selection, pressure-drop analysis, flow balancing, system volume, and hydraulic control
• Experience developing and owning P&IDs, mechanical calculations, equipment schedules, valve schedules, and instrumentation requirements
• Practical knowledge of chilled-water, condenser-water, glycol, or process-fluid systems
• Experience designing for commissioning, maintenance, isolation, flushing, venting, draining, and service access
• Ability to coordinate across engineering, manufacturing, controls, commissioning, and field teams
• Strong technical judgment and the ability to own work with limited oversight
• Experience with direct liquid cooling for AI or HPC systems
• Experience with CDUs, rack manifolds, cold plates, rear-door heat exchangers, liquid-to-liquid heat exchangers, or liquid-to-air systems
• Background in modular, prefabricated, skid-based, or containerized infrastructure
• Experience with AFT Fathom, Pipe-Flo, or comparable hydraulic modeling tools
• Familiarity with CFD, thermal modeling, or transient analysis
• Proficiency with AutoCAD, Revit, Plant 3D, SolidWorks, Inventor, or similar design tools
• Experience supporting FAT, SAT, IST, or field commissioning
• Professional Engineer license or equivalent technical depth