How to become Manufacturing Engineer in 2024

Manufacturing Engineer Design, integrate, or improve manufacturing systems or related processes. May work with commercial or industrial designers to refine product designs to increase producibility and decrease costs.

Manufacturing Engineer is Also Know as

In different settings, Manufacturing Engineer is titled as

  • Facility Engineer
  • Manufacturing Engineer
  • Plant Engineer
  • Process Engineer
  • Process Improvement Engineer

Education and Training of Manufacturing Engineer

Manufacturing Engineer is categorized in Job Zone Four: Considerable Preparation Needed

Experience Required for Manufacturing Engineer

A considerable amount of work-related skill, knowledge, or experience is needed for these occupations. For example, an accountant must complete four years of college and work for several years in accounting to be considered qualified.

Education Required for Manufacturing Engineer

Most of these occupations require a four-year bachelor's degree, but some do not.

Degrees Related to Manufacturing Engineer

Training Required for Manufacturing Engineer

Employees in these occupations usually need several years of work-related experience, on-the-job training, and/or vocational training.

Related Ocuupations

Some Ocuupations related to Manufacturing Engineer in different industries are

What Do Manufacturing Engineer do?

  • Apply continuous improvement methods, such as lean manufacturing, to enhance manufacturing quality, reliability, or cost-effectiveness.
  • Design layout of equipment or workspaces to achieve maximum efficiency.
  • Communicate manufacturing capabilities, production schedules, or other information to facilitate production processes.
  • Design, install, or troubleshoot manufacturing equipment.
  • Estimate costs, production times, or staffing requirements for new designs.
  • Evaluate manufactured products according to specifications and quality standards.
  • Investigate or resolve operational problems, such as material use variances or bottlenecks.
  • Prepare documentation for new manufacturing processes or engineering procedures.
  • Purchase equipment, materials, or parts.
  • Review product designs for manufacturability or completeness.
  • Troubleshoot new or existing product problems involving designs, materials, or processes.
  • Prepare reports summarizing information or trends related to manufacturing performance.
  • Provide technical expertise or support related to manufacturing.
  • Read current literature, talk with colleagues, participate in educational programs, attend meetings or workshops, or participate in professional organizations or conferences to keep abreast of developments in the manufacturing field.
  • Supervise technicians, technologists, analysts, administrative staff, or other engineers.
  • Train production personnel in new or existing methods.
  • Analyze the financial impacts of sustainable manufacturing processes or sustainable product manufacturing.
  • Develop sustainable manufacturing technologies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, minimize raw material use, replace toxic materials with non-toxic materials, replace non-renewable materials with renewable materials, or reduce waste.
  • Evaluate current or proposed manufacturing processes or practices for environmental sustainability, considering factors such as greenhouse gas emissions, air pollution, water pollution, energy use, or waste creation.
  • Redesign packaging for manufactured products to minimize raw material use or waste.
  • Identify opportunities or implement changes to improve manufacturing processes or products or to reduce costs, using knowledge of fabrication processes, tooling and production equipment, assembly methods, quality control standards, or product design, materials and parts.
  • Incorporate new manufacturing methods or processes to improve existing operations.
  • Determine root causes of failures or recommend changes in designs, tolerances, or processing methods, using statistical procedures.
  • Design tests of finished products or process capabilities to establish standards or validate process requirements.

Qualities of Good Manufacturing Engineer

  • Visualization: The ability to imagine how something will look after it is moved around or when its parts are moved or rearranged.
  • Near Vision: The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
  • Oral Comprehension: The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
  • Category Flexibility: The ability to generate or use different sets of rules for combining or grouping things in different ways.
  • Inductive Reasoning: The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
  • Problem Sensitivity: The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing that there is a problem.
  • Deductive Reasoning: The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
  • Information Ordering: The ability to arrange things or actions in a certain order or pattern according to a specific rule or set of rules (e.g., patterns of numbers, letters, words, pictures, mathematical operations).
  • Oral Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
  • Written Comprehension: The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
  • Mathematical Reasoning: The ability to choose the right mathematical methods or formulas to solve a problem.
  • Number Facility: The ability to add, subtract, multiply, or divide quickly and correctly.
  • Originality: The ability to come up with unusual or clever ideas about a given topic or situation, or to develop creative ways to solve a problem.
  • Fluency of Ideas: The ability to come up with a number of ideas about a topic (the number of ideas is important, not their quality, correctness, or creativity).
  • Written Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
  • Flexibility of Closure: The ability to identify or detect a known pattern (a figure, object, word, or sound) that is hidden in other distracting material.
  • Speech Recognition: The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
  • Speech Clarity: The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
  • Far Vision: The ability to see details at a distance.
  • Selective Attention: The ability to concentrate on a task over a period of time without being distracted.
  • Perceptual Speed: The ability to quickly and accurately compare similarities and differences among sets of letters, numbers, objects, pictures, or patterns. The things to be compared may be presented at the same time or one after the other. This ability also includes comparing a presented object with a remembered object.
  • Speed of Closure: The ability to quickly make sense of, combine, and organize information into meaningful patterns.
  • Auditory Attention: The ability to focus on a single source of sound in the presence of other distracting sounds.
  • Visual Color Discrimination: The ability to match or detect differences between colors, including shades of color and brightness.
  • Memorization: The ability to remember information such as words, numbers, pictures, and procedures.
  • Hearing Sensitivity: The ability to detect or tell the differences between sounds that vary in pitch and loudness.
  • Depth Perception: The ability to judge which of several objects is closer or farther away from you, or to judge the distance between you and an object.
  • Time Sharing: The ability to shift back and forth between two or more activities or sources of information (such as speech, sounds, touch, or other sources).
  • Arm-Hand Steadiness: The ability to keep your hand and arm steady while moving your arm or while holding your arm and hand in one position.
  • Finger Dexterity: The ability to make precisely coordinated movements of the fingers of one or both hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble very small objects.
  • Control Precision: The ability to quickly and repeatedly adjust the controls of a machine or a vehicle to exact positions.
  • Manual Dexterity: The ability to quickly move your hand, your hand together with your arm, or your two hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble objects.
  • Multilimb Coordination: The ability to coordinate two or more limbs (for example, two arms, two legs, or one leg and one arm) while sitting, standing, or lying down. It does not involve performing the activities while the whole body is in motion.
  • Wrist-Finger Speed: The ability to make fast, simple, repeated movements of the fingers, hands, and wrists.
  • Trunk Strength: The ability to use your abdominal and lower back muscles to support part of the body repeatedly or continuously over time without "giving out" or fatiguing.
  • Reaction Time: The ability to quickly respond (with the hand, finger, or foot) to a signal (sound, light, picture) when it appears.
  • Static Strength: The ability to exert maximum muscle force to lift, push, pull, or carry objects.
  • Stamina: The ability to exert yourself physically over long periods of time without getting winded or out of breath.
  • Rate Control: The ability to time your movements or the movement of a piece of equipment in anticipation of changes in the speed and/or direction of a moving object or scene.
  • Extent Flexibility: The ability to bend, stretch, twist, or reach with your body, arms, and/or legs.
  • Gross Body Equilibrium: The ability to keep or regain your body balance or stay upright when in an unstable position.
  • Gross Body Coordination: The ability to coordinate the movement of your arms, legs, and torso together when the whole body is in motion.
  • Dynamic Strength: The ability to exert muscle force repeatedly or continuously over time. This involves muscular endurance and resistance to muscle fatigue.
  • Spatial Orientation: The ability to know your location in relation to the environment or to know where other objects are in relation to you.
  • Response Orientation: The ability to choose quickly between two or more movements in response to two or more different signals (lights, sounds, pictures). It includes the speed with which the correct response is started with the hand, foot, or other body part.
  • Explosive Strength: The ability to use short bursts of muscle force to propel oneself (as in jumping or sprinting), or to throw an object.
  • Sound Localization: The ability to tell the direction from which a sound originated.
  • Speed of Limb Movement: The ability to quickly move the arms and legs.
  • Night Vision: The ability to see under low-light conditions.
  • Peripheral Vision: The ability to see objects or movement of objects to one's side when the eyes are looking ahead.
  • Glare Sensitivity: The ability to see objects in the presence of a glare or bright lighting.
  • Dynamic Flexibility: The ability to quickly and repeatedly bend, stretch, twist, or reach out with your body, arms, and/or legs.

Tools Used by Manufacturing Engineer

  • Desktop computers
  • Digital calipers
  • Digital micrometers
  • Laptop computers
  • Optical compound microscopes
  • Personal computers
  • Personal digital assistants PDA
  • Scientific calculators

Technology Skills required for Manufacturing Engineer

  • Autodesk AutoCAD
  • C
  • CNC Mastercam
  • Computer aided manufacturing CAM software
  • Computer numerical control CNC software
  • Dassault Systemes CATIA
  • Dassault Systemes SolidWorks
  • Eko
  • Enterprise resource planning ERP software
  • FileMaker Pro
  • Geometric CAMWorks
  • IBM Notes
  • Microsoft Access
  • Microsoft Excel
  • Microsoft Exchange
  • Microsoft Internet Explorer
  • Microsoft Office software
  • Microsoft Outlook
  • Microsoft PowerPoint
  • Microsoft Project
  • Microsoft SharePoint
  • Microsoft Visio
  • Microsoft Visual Basic
  • Microsoft Word
  • Minitab
  • National Instruments LabVIEW
  • Product lifecycle management PLM software
  • Programmable logic controller PLC software
  • PTC Creo Parametric
  • R
  • SAP software
  • Siemens NX
  • SolidWorks Enterprise PDM
  • Supervisory control and data acquisition SCADA software
  • The MathWorks MATLAB
  • Web browser software