I applied through a recruiter. The process took 3 months. I interviewed at SpaceX (Hawthorne, CA) in Dec 2014
Interview
I had a couple phone interviews and an extensive on sight interview. I was turned down a couple times, then after gaining more experience I was able to get my foot further in the door. The majority of questions throughout the phone interviews as well as on-sight were directed at my own projects, emphasizing that I was actually responsible for solving the problems that I claimed. They definitely ask more probing questions than any other interviews I've been on. The phone interviews were relatively brief, less than a half an hour, but fairly technical. The on-site was about 6 hours and definitely had some high intensity portions. A tour is followed by a 20 minute presentation about a problem you have solved, then followed by 6-8 one on one interviews. The facilities are extremely impressive so it's easy to get psyched-out, but overall the employees I met were all friendly and respectful. You can always get a year or two more experience and try again with more focused effort so it helped me not to build things up. The recruiter I had was very helpful, definitely gives the impression that he was there to make things go as well as possible. Overall I'm glad I had to put in a lot of work to make the job a reality.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Most questions were about the problems and solutions I had claimed. Many questions seemed to have the goal of proving whether or not I had thought through all aspects and had a good reason for every decision in the process.
Phone screen with recruiter followed by two phone calls with engineers and then an on-site interview where you present a presentation on a topic of your choice. Also other technical interviews on site as well.
Got reached out to by a recruiter on LinkedIn. Setting up an interview time was easy. The first interview screening was basically describing your past experiences. The second interview is technical. Whole process took a week.
Application
I interviewed at SpaceX (Hawthorne, CA)
Interview
Technical interview, pretty simple beam questions. Interview with lead engineer was about different machining/bonding techniques. Not a bad process. The recruiter was pretty responsive. Did not get another interview after interview with lead.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
If you applied a point load on a beam at the end, at which point does the beam experience the highest stress?