Air Hose Coupler as Pilot Valve

PeteS · Tue Oct 01, 2013 9:33 am

Not sure if others have done this or not, but...
If you grind off the tip of the male plug to where it clicks in but does not open the valve, you can then press on the male plug to open the valve. It makes a pretty good pilot valve, better than the cheapo air guns I have tried.

The 1/4" ones will pilot a sprinkler valve nicely, but are a bit marginal as a primary pilot for piloting the piston in my 3" chamber coaxial. In that gun I get some honking like " Whumph, whumph, whumph". I suspect that a 3/8" one might do the trick as the primary pilot without the sprinkler valve. A tuned up (airway opened up a bit) 1/4" one might even do the trick, but I have not tried that.

I might try turning down my own custom male plugs to have them click in only lightly to the ready position and then click in to a second grove to remain open when fully depressed. I'd also bore the opening out to the max.

So far to activate it, I have just pressed the plug without covering the hole, but a linkage or cable could be made if you want to get fancier. You could also drill holes in the side or just screw on a tee so you can press directly with no tendency to cover the hole.

PeteS · Tue Oct 01, 2013 5:17 pm

Update: I did some tweaking and it now pilots the 3" piston valve fine.

Also I found out that there are many different designs for these connectors and they definitely are not all created equal.

Thu Oct 03, 2013 11:01 am

Anyone who has ever used a similar QD in combination with a QEV has had the valve pop apon disconnecting the pressuresource...

What you are describing turns it into a poppetvalve, better known as a hammervalve.
Lacking the hammer though.

The thought of doing it this way has crossed my mind, but the large cross-section of the seal makes it very hard to open at higher pressures.

For my projects it wouldn't work, but for lower pressure/latge volume launchers it works well.