Sam Weiss

Provide Engineering, Product Development, and Project Management services to customers in the Defense, UAV, and consumer industries

• •Built Mesh Planner (meshplanner.com) web app to perform mesh-network line of sight analysis.
• •Developed and sold robust solar repeater nodes and rugged mobile radios for the Meshtastic community.

Led distributed hardware engineering team for 4+ years. Managed the mechanical, electrical, and firmware development efforts across multiple product generations. Oversaw the product development lifecycle from requirements definition through manufacturing and delivery of military-grade hardware. Successfully delivered hardware for 3 defense contracts valued at over $6 million.

• •Participated in senior leadership team and helped bring clarity to decisions on business strategy, resource allocation, and customer relations
• •Managed manufacturing operations and vendor relationships, consistently delivering high-quality hardware on schedule

Developed product requirements and electromechanical architectures for ruggedized military electronic systems. Designed enclosures, board profiles, user interfaces, and manufacturing processes for several products. Performed thermal analysis using FEA tools and designed thermal management solutions for harsh operating environments.

• •Designed the enclosures for more than 10 devices.
• •Passed several MIL-STD 810H tests for a rugged compute device.
• •Designed and assembled custom PCBs, daughter cards, cables, and accessories.
• •Built and tested products using additive manufacturing, machining, and compression-molded parts.

Provided consulting and contracting services to customers in the UAV, medical, and consumer industries. From retractable drone payloads for agriculture to VTOL aircraft qualification and payload integration.

• •Recommended VTOL aircraft based on customer requirements, integrated customer payloads, and performed flight testing
• •Designed a quick-release propeller mechanism to allow for quick and easy replacement. Worked with the motor vendor to manufacture a custom motor bell.
• •Provided the mechanical design for a retractable payload that allowed drones to take pictures from below crop canopies
• •Developed a VTOL aircraft leveraging unique controls architecture, additive manufacturing and mechanical design to minimize cost and maximize repairability

Designed the Teal One drone, including 15+ injection-molded and die-cast parts. Worked with Chinese-based factories to manufacture the tooling and parts. Visited factories to approve tooling before the production run. Succcessfully completed a pre-production run with 97% yield.

• •Worked closely with electrical engineers to integrate complex sensor systems and power management solutions
• •Managed plastics vendor relationships and optimized manufacturing processes for production efficiency
• •Designed the thermal management system to ensure optimal operating conditions for critical components
• •Analyzed vibration of sensor payloads and implemented damping solutions to improve data quality

Completed the design of the Teal Sport FPV drone. Worked with vendors to manufacture parts. Led flight testing operations to validate design changes and ensure reliability.

• •Designed accessories and mounting systems for various sensor payloads and equipment
• •Collaborated with cross-functional teams to optimize aircraft performance and reliability

Led the controls, structure, and fabrication teams to develop innovative VTOL aircraft for remote medical delivery. Worked closely with CEO to define product requirements. Directed the flight testing from early prototype to final aircraft. Led pilot project in Madagascar, demonstrating real-world application capabilities.

• •Went from concept to first flight in 2 months.
• •Quickly iterated and refined the design in preparation for pilot prject that occurred just 6 months after inception.
• •Implemented a meeting framework to improve cross-team communication and project coordination

Designed tandem wing VTOL UAV for remote medical delivery. Performed aerodynamic and structural analysis for the composite airframe. Designed the wing structures. Successfully performed flight testing and validation of the design.

• •Identified a critical stability error in third-party design and corrected it for better pitch stability and a larger CG range
• •Conducted structural analysis and optimization for composite airframe components
• •Worked on the fabrication team to manufacture several composite airframes

Was the first intern at Scaled Composites. Worked on the rocket motor team during the development of the SpaceShipTwo.

• •Performed quality assurance testing on rocket motor components and systems
• •Designed and completed variety of experiments to validate motor casing performance characteristics
• •Studied Scaled Composites unique design approaches and manufacturing techniques

Helped develop several UAV platforms for remote sensing research. Worked on fixed-wing and multirotor platforms. Mentored younger students in the design and fabrication of various UAV-related projects.

• •Led a team in the design and fabrication the BluJay fixed-wing UAV which had a 3.5 hour endurance to support extended remote sensing missions
• •Personally performed the aerodynamic, structural, propulsion, and manufacturing design for the BluJay UAV
• •Redesigned UAV wing profile and structure to increase its endurance by 40% and validated performance gains during flight testing
• •Redesigned UAV fuselage structure to be lighter and stronger for better survivability during belly landings
• •Assisted with propulsion systems sizing and avionics integration