I saw the posting for the Mechanical Design Co-op (May 2026) and I’m extremely interested. I’m a Mechanical Engineering student at the University of Ottawa 5th year. I had a couple of questions about the role and the design work involved.
From the description, it looks like the team designs pressure-rated enclosures, mechanical assemblies, cameras, lights, battery modules, connectors, and vehicle frames. I was wondering:
Are the enclosures and mechanical assemblies for existing Blue Robotics products (such as the BlueROV2, BlueBoat, or existing component lines), or are they part of a new product-development effort?
If the work relates to current products, what design challenges or limitations is the team looking to improve? (I.e, durability, sealing reliability, manufacturability, thermal performance, modularity, etc.)
And finally, what kind of contribution does a co-op student typically make on these projects? And is it a 4 month or 8 month coop ?
I’m very excited about the possibility of contributing to marine robotics and learning from your design team in Victoria. Thank you for your time, Prayot
I’ve passed your post along to our R&D team, in case someone’s up for providing their first-hand perspective and insights.
From my general understanding, R&D predominantly works on new products (spanning both variants and iterations of existing products, to completely new product types), with occasional investigative work if something starts going wrong with existing products on the line (e.g. to determine if a supplier’s tolerances, tooling, and/or materials have changed).
We’ve got many more ideas than the time and resources to pursue them all - you can watch our recent webinar to see a few of our ongoing product developments
As mentioned in the role description:
A motivated co-op can make substantial contributions to the design and validation of various products, and may even be invited back to finish a product development and/or to join us on a continuing basis. Co-ops are considered members of the team, just with the understanding that they’ll likely need more guidance and support than someone more experienced
Hi @EliotBR thank you for fowarding my questions to the R&D teams. I hope to hear from them pretty soon !
Thank you for your answer this is very helpful, it gives me a clearer idea about the role ! I will check out the recent webinar to learn more… I’m very excited to learn the new challenges/solutions/product you guys are trying to bring out to the world !
Thanks so much for sharing this, @EliotBR it’s genuinely inspiring to hear. Knowing that co-ops are able to make meaningful contributions and grow within the team makes the opportunity even more exciting for me. I’m patiently (and very excitedly! ) looking forward to hearing back about my application.Thanks again for the insight
Hi Prayot, I’m really glad to hear that what we do excites you! I’ve been with the R&D team for 5 years now and I really enjoy my job.
Eliot gave some great insight, especially that recent webinar - I’ll do my best to add on:
The R&D team is relatively small, so you get to see a project through from concept all the way to release, which is really exciting and relatively rare in industry
We mainly work on new products but we also dedicate time to improving existing products. We have been working hard to remove potting from our components recently, for example
We are always looking to improve our products in the areas you mentioned - they should remain accessible (affordable), so we are trying lots of new manufacturing technologies in addition to putting a lot of thought into design
I believe that co-op term lengths are flexible, although I am not directly involved in hiring
Thank you so much for taking the time to write such a thoughtful response
I really appreciate it. What you mentioned about seeing a project go from concept all the way to release honestly resonates with me a lot. It’s something I felt was missing during my previous co-op term, and it’s rare in industry, like you said. The idea of contributing to a product from scratch and then seeing it come to life in the real world, and actually make an impact, is exactly what motivates me in engineering !!
Hearing how your R&D team works, the focus on accessibility, experimenting with new manufacturing methods, and continuously improving existing products makes me even more excited. It aligns perfectly with the kind of engineering career I want to build.
Thanks again for your insight and for the encouragement, it really means a lot.
) looking forward to hearing back about my application.Thanks again for the insight