Senior Actuator Engineer – Hands Team

About the role

Rhoda AI is building generalist intelligent robots and needs a Senior Actuator Engineer to design the actuation at the heart of the robot hand. You will create compact, efficient motor‑and‑gearbox units that deliver human‑hand dexterity.

Key responsibilities

• Design compact motor‑gearbox actuator units for fingers and wrist, from concept through production.
• Architect miniaturized geartrains, especially planetary, meeting torque, backlash, and packaging targets at finger scale.
• Select and size motors based on torque, speed, power‑draw, thermal, and efficiency requirements.
• Build and run bench and dyno tests to characterize performance, efficiency, and durability.
• Collaborate with structures and electrical engineers on packaging, thermal paths, drive, and sensing integration.

Required profile

• Proven track record of designing and shipping gearboxes, especially planetary gearboxes.
• Experience miniaturizing geartrains for tightly packaged, weight‑ and volume‑constrained applications.
• Strong command of motor sizing and selection, including power draw, torque density, and efficiency analysis.

Required skills

• Gearbox design (planetary gearboxes)
• Miniaturized geartrain architecture
• Motor sizing and selection
• Bench and dyno testing