About the role
We are looking for a Guidance, Navigation, and Controls Engineer to build and own the entire guidance, navigation, and control stack for Wardstone’s interceptors. You will design the necessary development tools and flight control algorithms to ensure that Wardstone’s interceptors hit their target.
This is a highly cross-functional role. You will work closely with sensing, actuation, and propulsion engineers to deliver a performant autopilot.
What You’ll Do
Guidance Algorithm Development
- Design guidance laws for midcourse and terminal homing under high-speed, non-linear dynamics.
- Implement proportional navigation, augmented PN, pursuit/lead guidance, and/or optimal control methods.
- Develop intercept prediction algorithms using sensed tracking and state estimation inputs.
Flight Controls & Actuator Modeling
- Design and tune control loops for aerodynamic surfaces, thrust vectoring, or impulse-based actuators.
- Model actuator bandwidth, latency, saturation, and uncertainties.
- Implement robust control strategies for high-G, high-rate maneuvers.
State Estimation & Sensor Fusion
- Implement EKFs/UKFs for fusing IR sensor data, IMU, GPS, and onboard timing signals.
- Build prediction and filtering pipelines that operate reliably under noise, jitter, and thermal effects.
- Develop relative navigation and target-state estimation algorithms.
Simulation & 6DOF Modeling
- Build and maintain high-fidelity 6DOF simulations of interceptor dynamics.
- Integrate aerodynamic models (> Mach 1), control response, propulsion events, and sensor models.
- Run Monte Carlo and worst-case analyses to drive design decisions.
