Company: Hydro-Spade
Position: Mechanical Design Engineer (SolidWorks)
Location: St. George, Brant, Ontario
Hours: Monday-Thursday 7:30am – 4:30 pm; Friday 7:30am – 4 pm
Reports to: Owner
Compensation: $110,000 - $160,000 annually
Position Type: Newly created role
To be considered for the position, please complete the first step in the application process through this link - please copy and paste it into the browser:
https://assessment.predictiveindex.com/bo/I81/MechanicalDesignEngineerHydroSpade2026
About Hydro-Spade
Hydro-Spade designs and manufactures mid-size mobile hydro vac equipment, including trucks, trailers, and skid-mounted units. Their equipment is built around a simple philosophy: dependable systems, quality components, and practical designs built to perform in demanding environments.
Based in St. George, Ontario, Hydro-Spade has an established product and significant opportunity ahead. The engineering systems, processes, and product development capabilities behind that product need to scale alongside it.
About the Role
Do you enjoy taking a rough idea, sketch, or problem and turning it into a detailed design that can actually be built? Hydro-Spade is seeking a Mechanical Design Engineer with advanced SolidWorks expertise to lead that process from concept to finished product, and to build the engineering function around it.
We are looking for someone to be Hydro-Spade's internal SolidWorks expert, with capabilities well beyond basic modelling and drafting. You know how to structure models, drawings, BOMs, libraries, and design standards so they are efficient to use, easy to revise, and practical to manufacture and maintain.
You are technically strong, practical, decisive, and comfortable operating with some ambiguity. You understand that good engineering requires attention to detail, but you also know when there is enough information to make a decision and move the design forward.
This role offers the opportunity to directly influence how Hydro-Spade improves existing equipment, how new products are designed, and how the engineering function scales with the business.
Key Responsibilities
- Advanced SolidWorks Design: Design and develop complex mechanical equipment and assemblies using advanced SolidWorks capabilities, with a focus on model quality, efficiency, manufacturability, and long-term maintainability.
- SolidWorks Leadership: Serve as Hydro-Spade's internal SolidWorks expert, establishing strong modelling practices across assemblies, configurations, weldments, sheet metal, drawings, BOMs, custom properties, templates, libraries, and engineering standards.
- New Product & Existing Equipment Design: Lead the mechanical design of Hydro-Spade trucks, trailers, and mobile equipment, while also redesigning and improving existing products.
- Design for Manufacturing: Work closely with manufacturing to ensure designs are practical to fabricate, weld, assemble, and service.
- Mechanical & Equipment Design: Design complete equipment layouts considering structural requirements, component selection, weight, load distribution, manufacturability, serviceability, and real-world operating conditions.
- Engineering Calculations: Complete and validate the calculations required to support safe and reliable equipment designs.
- Hydraulic & Electrical Integration: Apply a strong working understanding of hydraulic and electrical systems to bring components and controls into the overall equipment design, working with suppliers and OEMs to get the technical information needed for proper integration.
- Supplier & Regulatory Coordination: Work with technical suppliers and ensure designs consider applicable Canadian and U.S. requirements for mobile equipment, vehicle dimensions, axle loads, and weight distribution.
- SolidWorks PDM: Help establish and implement SolidWorks PDM, including file structure, naming conventions, revision control, libraries, permissions, and engineering workflows.
- ERP & Engineering Data: Help establish how BOMs, part information, revisions, drawings, and engineering data flow from SolidWorks and PDM into the company's ERP system.
- Technical Leadership & Standards: Provide technical guidance to the Mechanical Designer and help establish the engineering standards, documentation, and processes required for the function to scale effectively.
Year One - What Success Looks Like
- All current Hydro-Spade equipment has been accurately modelled in SolidWorks, creating a reliable foundation for future revisions, improvements, and new product development.
- Hydro-Spade's use of SolidWorks is continually improving, with stronger modelling practices, better consistency, more efficient workflows, and clearer standards across the engineering function.
Qualifications
Required
- Advanced SolidWorks expertise, with a minimum of 5 years of mechanical design or mechanical engineering experience, ideally in heavy equipment, mobile machinery, trailers, vocational vehicles, agricultural equipment, or a related manufacturing environment.
- An Engineering degree or professional designation is not required. We value hands-on, practical experience as much as formal training.
- Experience designing hydraulic and/or electrical systems that have gone through a full manufacturing process, from design through to a tested, working build.
- Practical, on-the-job industry experience with design for manufacturing, including fabrication, welding, assembly, and serviceability, ideally backed by hands-on experience building, servicing, or modifying mechanical equipment.
Preferred
- Experience with SolidWorks PDM (file structure, revision control, libraries, workflows).
- Experience with ERP systems and engineering data (BOMs, part structures, revisions, engineering change processes).
- Familiarity with Canadian and U.S. Road regulations, vehicle weights, dimensions, or mobile-equipment compliance.
Compensation
- $110,000 - $160,000 annually
- Health Spending Account
