New pic and text added to bottom of thread. 5/5/08
I wish I had a digital movie camera to capture the gates in action! My digital still camera takes bad movies.
Anyway- here is where we stand-
All the gates and solenoid valves are mounted behind the walls or under the floor.
Air lines have been run to all solenoids and actuators.
Manual control stations have been wired.
The special circuit board (
subject of my previous post) that starts the DC is installed and works great. This circuit senses when any gate has been opened and starts the DC- it eliminates the need to have a switch at each gate or machine.
Almost everything is wired (and works great!!!). All that remains are the machine connections. I will either install small relays in each machine or go back to my original plan that required current sensing switches at each outlet.
From L to R: Auto-gate manual control station, blast gate air regulator and gauge (blast gates run on 15-20 psi), power switch for the 24V solenoid transformer, original shop air regulator, etc. original DC START/STOP buttons-
One of the auto-gate manual control stations:
All that is visible on the wall are the DC ports (gray inside is the gate slide), and manual control stations:
The wizardry behind the curtain (wall). On the left is the plumbing for the shop air (blue thing is a filter). On the right is the plumbing for the auto-gate air.
The gray transformer provides 24V DC to the solenoids (the circuit board to start the DC blower is inside the lower part of the enclosure). The brown bell wire provides 24V to the solenoid valves.
A wired and plumbed auto-gate. The solenoid valve is on the right. The actuating cylinders are double acting- powered open and closed, so require two hose connections. This particular 4" blast gate is one of the first ones I made about 8 - 10 years ago for my old shop in VA.
One of the garage ceiling mounted blast gates for the in-floor DC port to the table saw. A similar one is for the jointer:
A close-up of one of the smaller solenoid valves (I have two different sizes from two separate Ebay purchases. Solenoid valves and actuating cylinders were all from Ebay). The gray and orange fitting is a flow restrictor. I discovered I needed them to slow down gate actuation speed. The brass colored fittings are exhaust port filters/mufflers- I put them on the keep spiders from taking up residence in the solenoid valve.
Update:
I outfitted some of my auto-gates with current sensing switches. I put small current sensor switches in electrical boxes which I mounted next to the 120V and 220V outlet boxes in my kneewalls. One conductor (the black, "sensed wire") runs from the outlet box, to the coil box, through the opening in the coil, then back to the outlet box. The coil and its internal circuitry sense when there is current running in the conductor and closes an internal switch which is wired to the solenoid valves (black and orange wires.) Though the rating of the switch is limited, it is sufficient to control the 24V solenoids. Slicker than snot, as it were!!!
Uh, nice plumbing and wiring Alan.
.gif "Drogar Laugh(DBG)")
Truths: There is no such thing as a 25 hour day, so why do I keep trying to cram so much into every day so it seems that way! 
I 
"Go as far as you can see, when you get there, you will be able to see further, but never forget where you started from." Thomas Carlyle
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