Design Engineer

SHERYL FREDRICKS

**** ****** *** ** 616-***-****

Rockford, Michigan 49341 ***************@*****.***

SUMMARY

Skilled professional with 20 years of results driven experience in design and project leadership. Expertise in

development of engineering designs from concept through production. Leads internal and external resource

teams and effectively communicates with customers and suppliers. Extensive background in accurate

documentation for the engineering change process and customer data management.

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

BENTELER GROUP, Grand Rapids/Holland/Galesburg/Auburn Hills, Michigan 2009 - Present

Senior Designer - Defense & Automotive Structures / Program Manager - Automotive Structures

Promoted from within the company with increased responsibilities.

Led multi-functional teams to manufacture structural safety components for several vehicle programs,

meeting or exceeding customer and business expectations for cost, timing and quality.

Developed innovative products for hot stamped armor and automotive structures, improving survivability

and performance while reducing manufacturing cost and achieved 8-50% weight savings.

Created geometrically accurate hot stamped armor solutions to replace current cut and weld technology,

eliminating costly tool changes with 100% accuracy in design, using surfacing and parametric modeling

techniques.

Designed ground-breaking tool solutions for low cost, internal and external water quenching after

benchmarking pilot hot stamp armor line in Germany.

Hands-on involvement with manufacturing, engineering, purchasing, and installation of equipment.

Formulated departmental procedures, new part numbering system, product data management structure,

titleblocks, and design standards for start-up defense company and existing automotive product group.

Led design of the first hot stamp armor line in North America, a $3.6 million investment.

Designed innovative low-cost prototype tooling that would reduce tooling cost by up to 90%.

Supported multi-discipline activities for all defense programs from proposal and quotation through

execution and delivery.

Maintained document control for ITAR (International Traffic in Arms Regulations) data for new

company start-up and business closure.

ADAC AUTOMOTIVE INC., Grand Rapids, Michigan 2006 - 2009

Lead Design Engineer

Designed components for assemblies to ensure proper fit and function using tolerance stacks, swing

studies, results of moldflow analysis, finite element analysis, and crash analysis.

Participated in a management team to develop procedures to improve communication and red uce

engineering changes and led the implementation of changes into the design department.

Developed safety technology, together with a team of engineers, to stop a car door handle from opening

in a crash.

Prioritized and assigned design tasks to design team, necessary to meet program timeline requirements.

Improved productivity of design team through user group leadership and participation.

JOHNSON CONTROLS, INC., Holland, Michigan 2004 - 2006

Lead Design Engineer

Designed plastic components for assemblies resulting in improved craftsmanship, quality, safety, tooling,

serviceability, and cost savings, using problem solving techniques such as Kepner-Tregoe and Pugh.

Maintained design issues list to organize and assign priorities for team of up to 15 designers to ensure

program timeline requirements were met.

Collaborated with customer to define Class A surface through feasibility analysis in the concept design

stage to ensure product quality and manufacturabity.

SHERYL FREDRICKS

JOHNSON CONTROLS, INC., (Continued)

Enhanced productivity of off-shore design team by reducing rework through mentoring and effective

pictorial, written, and verbal communication.

Evaluated results from finite element analysis to make design modifications to meet Federal Motor

Vehicle Safety Standards and structural specifications set by the customer.

Translated results from mold flow studies into design solutions critical for tooling feasibility.

Managed and supported tool design issues for an off-shore tooling supplier for more than 50 production

tools.

Researched and evaluated various manufacturing processes to improve products and meet customer

requests and expectations.

Worked directly with customers and program management to ensure accuracy in the engineering change

control process.

2001 – 2004

FREDRICKS DESIGN, INC., Grand Haven, Michigan

Lead Product Designer

Designed components, complex assemblies, and electronics packaging using feasibility sections,

surfacing and solid parametric modeling.

Trained team members in engineering change documentation and data management to improve customer

satisfaction.

Certified Internal ISO Auditor.

1996 – 2001

DYNAMIC TECHNOLOGIES AND DESIGN, INC., Grand Rapids, Michigan

Product Designer / Project Design Leader

Managed large automotive project with complex bill of materials with up to 18 primary assembl y

configurations involving more than 50 components, coordinating the design objectives of 3 to 10

designers, from concept through production.

Performed 3-D design of interior and exterior trim components specializing in plastic injection molded

parts. Also worked with metal stampings and castings.

Insured proper fit and function of assemblies with moving parts through swing study analysis.

Became preferred supplier by gaining expertise in the customer engineering change process.

Improved productivity through system administration and data management.

DIESEL TECHNOLOGY COMPANY, Grand Rapids, Michigan 1994 - 1996

Industrial Engineer / Facility Management Intern

Evaluated the manufacturing process to develop improved plant and office layouts in CAD.

Scheduled relocation and maintenance of equipment required to ensure smooth transition.

Improved production yield through tool crib inventory management and purchasing support.

EDUCATION & TECHNICAL TRAINING

Bachelor of Business Administration, Grand Valley State University, Allendale, Michigan

Design, Engineering and Plastics; Grand Rapids Community College, Grand Rapids, Michigan

Catia V5 Training, Rand Worldwide, Grand Rapids, Michigan

SolidWorks Essentials, Drawings, Advanced Surface Modeling, Advanced Part Des ign, and Advanced

Assembly Design; Dasi Solutions, Grand Rapids, Michigan

Additional Training: Introduction to Pro/Engineer Wildfire 5.0, Essentials for NX Designers with

TeamCenter Integration, TeamCenter Engineering, WERS, 5S, Geometric Dimensioning and

Tolerancing, Effective Communication, Time Management, Presentation Skills, Problem Solving, and

Basic Engineering Analysis

TECHNOLOGY SKILLS

Catia V5, SolidWorks, Pro/Engineer Wildfire, I-DEAS, NX (Formerly UG or Unigraphics), TeamCenter,

SAP, EBP, WERS, TCP, TCP2, UNIX, Windows, Microsoft Word, Excel, Project and PowerPoint

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