Engineer or Project Engineer in Cheshire, Crewe

Are you an experienced Project Engineer who thrives on solving complex engineering challenges? Do you take pride in delivering high-quality work that keeps vital rail services moving across the UK? Are you ready to contribute to projects that have a real, visible impact on safety, performance, and reliability? If so, this could be the perfect next step in your engineering career.

The Opportunity

• 12-month secondment opportunity
• 37.5 hours per week (Monday–Friday)
• Starting salary: £44,657.57 (increasing upon full competency)
• Location: Crewe depot

This is an opportunity to join a high-performing engineering environment where your work directly supports the delivery of critical heavy maintenance projects across a modern and diverse fleet.

About the Environment

Working within a busy depot, you’ll be part of a collaborative and safety-focused team delivering heavy maintenance, overhaul, and upgrade programmes on rolling stock and associated assets. The environment is fast-paced and delivery-driven, where engineering excellence, clear communication, and structured processes are critical to ensuring that vehicles return to service safely, reliably, and on time. You’ll interface daily with production teams, planners, materials, and project stakeholders—playing a central role in ensuring projects run smoothly from concept through to completion.

The Role

Reporting to the Heavy Maintenance Manager, you’ll take ownership of engineering planning and project support activities across assigned workstreams. Your focus will be on ensuring that all project documentation, instructions, and engineering inputs are in place to enable efficient and compliant delivery of maintenance activities. You’ll not only support delivery but actively look for opportunities to improve processes, reduce inefficiencies, and enhance overall project performance.

Key Responsibilities

• Project Planning & Engineering Support
  • Develop and maintain detailed Work Breakdown Structures (WBS) and production plans
  • Create and manage heavy maintenance block cards, job packs, and technical work instructions
  • Ensure all engineering documentation is accurate, up-to-date, and accessible to production teams
• Operational Delivery
  • Support day-to-day production activities, ensuring alignment with project plans and timescales
  • Ensure all start-of-shift and end-of-shift processes are followed consistently
  • Lead and facilitate daily production meetings, tracking progress and resolving blockers
• Technical & Problem Solving
  • Act as a key point of contact for technical queries, raising and closing them with internal teams and customers
  • Work closely with materials and supply chain functions to resolve availability, obsolescence, or substitution issues
  • Provide hands-on engineering support in resolving complex maintenance challenges
• Process Improvement & Compliance
  • Ensure adherence to heavy maintenance procedures and governance requirements
  • Identify opportunities to drive continuous improvement across engineering and production processes
  • Support updates to engineering process documentation and standards
• Communication & Leadership
  • Deliver toolbox talks and single-point lessons linked to project risks, learnings, and changes
  • Build strong working relationships across production, planning, and management teams
  • Support the Heavy Maintenance Manager in delivering projects safely, on time, and within scope

What You’ll Bring

• Minimum City & Guilds / BTEC / NVQ Level 3 in Engineering
• Proven experience in a project engineering or heavy maintenance environment
• Strong understanding of traction and rolling stock systems
• A proactive, problem-solving mindset with strong attention to detail
• Ability to manage multiple priorities in a fast-paced operational setting
• A full, valid UK driving licence
• Experience gained within heavy maintenance environments across rail, HGV/PSV, or other comparable engineering sectors with transferable mechanical and diagnostic expertise would be highly beneficial.

What Success Looks Like

• Projects delivered safely, on time, and to required quality standards
• Strong collaboration between engineering, production, and materials teams
• Clear, structured documentation enabling efficient workshop delivery
• Continuous improvements identified and implemented across processes
• A positive, solutions-focused presence within the depot team

Benefits

• 25 days annual leave plus UK bank holidays
• Pension scheme
• Life assurance and healthcare cover
• Travel benefits
• Cycle to Work scheme
• Retail discount platform

Why Apply?

This is more than just a Project Engineer role—it’s an opportunity to work at the heart of heavy maintenance operations, where your decisions and input directly influence performance, safety, and reliability. You’ll be joining a team that values:

• Doing the right thing
• Taking pride in quality work
• Making a real difference through engineering