Drake Nickels

MECHANICAL ENGINEER

Skills Overview

Drake is an accomplished mechanical engineer with years of experience in the aerospace industry, working on complex thermal-fluid components and solenoid thrusters, with additional experience in market analysis. His tenure supporting assembly lines, test labs, and in design environments ensures a well-rounded view of problems and practical solutions. A mechanical engineer at heart, Drake is motivated to understand and enjoys difficult challenges. His strengths include fluid component design, design for manufacturing and assembly, creating analytical models, and team collaboration.

• ANALYTICAL MODELING – Drake is driven to make processes more efficient and frequently makes analytical models to run calculations or organise data to provide additional insight. His models have been used to drive company decisions regarding product repair forecasts for aircraft component returns. Drake not only makes models with detail but ensures they can be easily used by the greater team.
• CROSS TEAM COLLABORATION – Drake is accustomed to working with team members across different areas of a company, from production, to sourcing, to project management. He communicates well and balances the needs of different departments to successfully drive projects forward.
• DESIGN FOR MANUFACTURE/DESIGN FOR ASSEMBLY – Drake has significant experience working hands on in the creation of prototype hardware within new product lines, including understanding the manufacturing methods that create the hardware and tools. Applying direct learnings from these experiences allows him to improve the products, tools, and processes yielding more successful designs using DFM and DFA principles.
• FLUID COMPONENT DESIGN – Drake has experience in the design of numerous fluid system components for the aerospace industry, including pressurising valves, solenoid valves, and fuel metering valves. His experience with components in aircraft turbine engines yields a broader system level thinking that he applies to all problems encountered.
• TECHNICAL COMMUNICATION – Drake is well versed in communicating technical information in a variety of formats. Whether presenting technical models, customer design reviews, or writing detailed reports substantiating testing or process changes, he can be relied on to effectively communicate information to all levels of a business.

Project Experience