Contract mechanical engineer vs senior mechanical designer

The differences between contract mechanical engineers and senior mechanical designers can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. It typically takes 4-6 years to become both a contract mechanical engineer and a senior mechanical designer. Additionally, a senior mechanical designer has an average salary of $103,765, which is higher than the $84,269 average annual salary of a contract mechanical engineer.

The top three skills for a contract mechanical engineer include solidworks, assembly drawings and autocad. The most important skills for a senior mechanical designer are CAD, mechanical design, and GD.

Contract mechanical engineer vs senior mechanical designer overview

	Contract Mechanical Engineer	Senior Mechanical Designer
Yearly salary	$84,269	$103,765
Hourly rate	$40.51	$49.89
Growth rate	2%	2%
Number of jobs	84,503	71,958
Job satisfaction	-	-
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 81%	Bachelor's Degree, 48%
Average age	41	41
Years of experience	6	6

Contract mechanical engineer vs senior mechanical designer salary

Contract mechanical engineers and senior mechanical designers have different pay scales, as shown below.

	Contract Mechanical Engineer	Senior Mechanical Designer
Average salary	$84,269	$103,765
Salary range	Between $64,000 And $110,000	Between $81,000 And $131,000
Highest paying City	-	San Francisco, CA
Highest paying state	-	California
Best paying company	-	Google
Best paying industry	-	Automotive

Differences between contract mechanical engineer and senior mechanical designer education

There are a few differences between a contract mechanical engineer and a senior mechanical designer in terms of educational background:

	Contract Mechanical Engineer	Senior Mechanical Designer
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 81%	Bachelor's Degree, 48%
Most common major	Mechanical Engineering	Mechanical Engineering
Most common college	Michigan Technological University	Carnegie Mellon University

Contract mechanical engineer vs senior mechanical designer demographics

Here are the differences between contract mechanical engineers' and senior mechanical designers' demographics:

	Contract Mechanical Engineer	Senior Mechanical Designer
Average age	41	41
Gender ratio	Male, 91.5% Female, 8.5%	Male, 94.1% Female, 5.9%
Race ratio	Black or African American, 3.3% Unknown, 4.6% Hispanic or Latino, 9.0% Asian, 13.9% White, 69.1% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.1%	Black or African American, 3.4% Unknown, 4.6% Hispanic or Latino, 9.3% Asian, 11.4% White, 71.3% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.1%
LGBT Percentage	5%	5%

Differences between contract mechanical engineer and senior mechanical designer duties and responsibilities

Contract mechanical engineer example responsibilities.

Provide mechanical design and sustaining engineering expertise to troubleshoot manufacturing defect trends and achieve a more robust and producible product.
Document as built drawing ECN's, ECO's, & ECR's into archive files.
Utilize SolidWorks and FEA analysis, and classical analysis to develop products.
Design of plastic injection & sheet metal components, perform FEA's and other design relate functions.
Upload files into PDM and EPDM.
Used SolidWorks PDM to save files.

Senior mechanical designer example responsibilities.

Lead FPGA development of key digital communication component used in successful demonstration of spacecraft radio link.
Create and modify very large assemblies in Creo which are used to create drawings for top level spacecraft assemblies.
Generate fabrication and assembly drawings for fabrication of commercial/Industrial water heaters and boilers base on ISO 9000 and AWA standards.
Perform complex interference fit checks, motion studies, and tolerance stack-up analysis on large assemblies using Pro/E - Creo software.
Verify all design factors including performance, tolerances, fitting, materials, surface finish and BOM for components and systems.
Improve dynamic response of microscope using ANSYS vibration simulation.

Contract mechanical engineer vs senior mechanical designer skills

Common contract mechanical engineer skills

Solidworks, 16%
Assembly Drawings, 6%
Autocad, 6%
Prototype, 4%
FEA, 4%
R, 4%

Common senior mechanical designer skills

CAD, 12%
Mechanical Design, 11%
GD, 5%
Creo, 5%
Autocad, 4%
FEA, 4%

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Contract Mechanical Engineer
Contract Mechanical Engineer vs Senior Mechanical Designer

Updated January 8, 2025

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