How to become Automotive Engineer in 2024

Automotive Engineer Develop new or improved designs for vehicle structural members, engines, transmissions, or other vehicle systems, using computer-assisted design technology. Direct building, modification, or testing of vehicle or components.

Automotive Engineer is Also Know as

In different settings, Automotive Engineer is titled as

  • Dimensional Integration Engineer
  • Engineer
  • Product Engineer
  • Project Engineer
  • Research Engineer

Education and Training of Automotive Engineer

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

Experience Required for Automotive 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 Automotive Engineer

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

Degrees Related to Automotive Engineer

Training Required for Automotive 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 Automotive Engineer in different industries are

What Do Automotive Engineer do?

  • Read current literature, attend meetings or conferences, or talk with colleagues to stay abreast of new automotive technology or competitive products.
  • Establish production or quality control standards.
  • Prepare or present technical or project status reports.
  • Develop or implement operating methods or procedures.
  • Write, review, or maintain engineering documentation.
  • Conduct research studies to develop new concepts in the field of automotive engineering.
  • Coordinate production activities with other functional units, such as procurement, maintenance, or quality control.
  • Provide technical direction to other engineers or engineering support personnel.
  • Perform failure, variation, or root cause analyses.
  • Develop or integrate control feature requirements.
  • Develop engineering specifications or cost estimates for automotive design concepts.
  • Develop calibration methodologies, test methodologies, or tools.
  • Conduct automotive design reviews.
  • Calibrate vehicle systems, including control algorithms or other software systems.
  • Build models for algorithm or control feature verification testing.
  • Alter or modify designs to obtain specified functional or operational performance.
  • Design or analyze automobile systems in areas such as aerodynamics, alternate fuels, ergonomics, hybrid power, brakes, transmissions, steering, calibration, safety, or diagnostics.
  • Conduct or direct system-level automotive testing.
  • Design control systems or algorithms for purposes such as automotive energy management, emissions management, or increased operational safety or performance.
  • Create design alternatives for vehicle components, such as camless or dual-clutch engines or alternative air-conditioning systems, to increase fuel efficiency.
  • Design vehicles for increased recyclability or use of natural, renewable, or recycled materials in vehicle construction.
  • Design vehicles that use lighter materials, such as aluminum, magnesium alloy, or plastic, to improve fuel efficiency.
  • Develop specifications for vehicles powered by alternative fuels or alternative power methods.
  • Research computerized automotive applications, such as telemetrics, intelligent transportation systems, artificial intelligence, or automatic control.
  • Research or implement green automotive technologies involving alternative fuels, electric or hybrid cars, or lighter or more fuel-efficient vehicles.

Qualities of Good Automotive Engineer

  • Written Comprehension: The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
  • Oral Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
  • 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.
  • Inductive Reasoning: The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
  • Oral Comprehension: The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
  • Written Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
  • 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).
  • 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.
  • Mathematical Reasoning: The ability to choose the right mathematical methods or formulas to solve a problem.
  • Speech Clarity: The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
  • Speech Recognition: The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
  • Near Vision: The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
  • Visualization: The ability to imagine how something will look after it is moved around or when its parts are moved or rearranged.
  • 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).
  • Number Facility: The ability to add, subtract, multiply, or divide quickly and correctly.
  • Category Flexibility: The ability to generate or use different sets of rules for combining or grouping things in different ways.
  • 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.
  • 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.
  • Visual Color Discrimination: The ability to match or detect differences between colors, including shades of color and brightness.
  • 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.
  • Memorization: The ability to remember information such as words, numbers, pictures, and procedures.
  • 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).
  • 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.
  • 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.
  • Auditory Attention: The ability to focus on a single source of sound in the presence of other distracting sounds.
  • Hearing Sensitivity: The ability to detect or tell the differences between sounds that vary in pitch and loudness.
  • Sound Localization: The ability to tell the direction from which a sound originated.
  • Spatial Orientation: The ability to know your location in relation to the environment or to know where other objects are in relation to you.
  • 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.
  • Reaction Time: The ability to quickly respond (with the hand, finger, or foot) to a signal (sound, light, picture) when it appears.
  • 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.
  • 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.
  • 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.
  • Control Precision: The ability to quickly and repeatedly adjust the controls of a machine or a vehicle to exact positions.
  • 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.
  • 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.
  • 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.
  • Speed of Limb Movement: The ability to quickly move the arms and legs.
  • Wrist-Finger Speed: The ability to make fast, simple, repeated movements of the fingers, hands, and wrists.
  • 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 Flexibility: The ability to quickly and repeatedly bend, stretch, twist, or reach out with your body, arms, and/or legs.
  • Extent Flexibility: The ability to bend, stretch, twist, or reach with your body, arms, and/or legs.
  • Stamina: The ability to exert yourself physically over long periods of time without getting winded or out of breath.
  • Dynamic Strength: The ability to exert muscle force repeatedly or continuously over time. This involves muscular endurance and resistance to muscle fatigue.
  • Explosive Strength: The ability to use short bursts of muscle force to propel oneself (as in jumping or sprinting), or to throw an object.
  • Static Strength: The ability to exert maximum muscle force to lift, push, pull, or carry objects.

Tools Used by Automotive Engineer

  • Air compressors
  • Anechoic chambers
  • Bench drill presses
  • Bench grinders
  • Carbon dioxide analyzers
  • Climate test chambers
  • Computerized numerical control CNC lathes
  • Digital cameras
  • Disc finishing machines
  • Engine test dynamometers
  • Five-axis machining centers
  • Floor drill presses
  • Gas analyzers
  • Horizontal band saws
  • Hydraulic hoists
  • Hydraulic presses
  • Hydraulic winches
  • Hydrogen analyzers
  • Laminar flow elements
  • Metal inert gas MIG welders
  • Miliohm meters
  • Multitasking lathes
  • Overhead cranes
  • Oxygen analyzers
  • Plasma cutters
  • Pressure gauges
  • Pressure indicators
  • Pressure transducers
  • Rotary vehicle lifts
  • Sand blasters
  • Spectrometers
  • Spectroscopes
  • Strain gauges
  • Thermocouples
  • Three-axis vertical mills
  • Three-dimensional prototyping printer
  • Torque gauges
  • Transmission dynamometers
  • Vertical bandsaws
  • Welders
  • Wind tunnels
  • Workshop cranes

Technology Skills required for Automotive Engineer

  • 1CadCam Unigraphics
  • Adobe Photoshop
  • Altair Engineering MotionSolve
  • Ambient Design ArtRage
  • Ansys Fluent
  • ANSYS simulation software
  • Apache Groovy
  • Ashlar-Vellum Graphite
  • Atlassian Bamboo
  • Atlassian Confluence
  • Atlassian JIRA
  • Autodesk Alias Automotive
  • Autodesk AutoCAD
  • Autodesk AutoCAD Mechanical
  • Autodesk Inventor
  • Autodesk SketchBook Pro
  • AVL AVL CRUISE
  • C
  • C#
  • C++
  • CADRE Analytic
  • CNC Mastercam
  • Computer aided design CAD software
  • Corel Painter
  • Corel Painter Sketch Pad
  • Dassault Systemes CATIA
  • Dassault Systemes Simulia Abaqus FEA
  • Dassault Systemes SolidWorks
  • Data acquisition systems
  • Debugging software
  • Digital Equipment Corporation DIGITAL Fortran 90
  • Extensible markup language XML
  • Gamma Technologies GT-SUITE
  • Git
  • GNU Image Manipulation Program GIMP
  • Hardware-in-the-loop HIL simulation software
  • IBM Notes
  • International Material Data System IMDS
  • IronCAD
  • JavaScript
  • JavaScript Object Notation JSON
  • Jenkins CI
  • JUnit
  • Linux
  • LMS Imagine.Lab AMESim
  • Magellan Firmware
  • MAHLE Powertrain
  • Maplesoft Maple
  • Maplesoft MapleSim
  • MathWorks Simulink
  • Mentor Graphics Flowmaster
  • Metrologic Group Metrolog XG
  • Microsoft .NET Framework
  • Microsoft Excel
  • Microsoft Office software
  • Microsoft PowerPoint
  • Microsoft Project
  • Microsoft Visio
  • Microsoft Visual Basic Scripting Edition VBScript
  • Microsoft Visual Studio
  • Microsoft Windows
  • Microsoft Word
  • Minitab
  • Node.js
  • Object oriented development environment software
  • Oracle Java
  • Perl
  • Portalgraphics openCanvas
  • Python
  • Salesforce software
  • SAP software
  • Selenium
  • Siemens NX
  • Siemens Solid Edge
  • Somat eDAQ
  • Statistical analysis software
  • Structured query language SQL
  • Swift
  • TestNG
  • The MathWorks MATLAB
  • Think3 ThinkDesign Engineering
  • UNIX
  • Very high-speed integrated circuit VHSIC hardware description language VHDL
  • Xcode