Please keep in mind that you are talking to a lame brain that has no experience with arduino here. Im trying too control this valve Electric Actuated On/Off Brass Ball Valve | Lead Free| Valworx from a remote location via arduino. I operate Biogas generators and manual 1 in ball valves are what I use to open and close fuel lines on the genset. Since they are manual I have to physically be on site to restart if there is a shutdown. So I need to be able to control these valves from a remote location. Any help that you guys could give me would be much appreciated. Can this be done?
You need to understand how to operate the valve in electrical terms before you can go any further. I haven't followed those links far enough to do that for you. For example it may be that you need to apply power to open the valve and remove power to close it, or you may need to reverse polarity to close it. You also need to know how much current the valve will draw when it is working. Then you need to select a motor driver circuit to drive it. If it only needs an Amp or two you should be able to find an Arduino shield which supports that voltage and current. If it needs more current then you could either look for non-Arduino drivers, or consider just using a relay to operate the valve - the relay would take much less current so be easier to control.
I don't know how much force those mechanical valves need to operate, but have you considered using some sort of servo motor to operate them? There are some pretty torquey RC servo motors available for big models and it's easy to control them with an Arduino.
Looks feasible enough. Provide 10V at a pin to open, 10V an another to close. As PeterH suggests, you'll need some additional hardware to actually switch the voltage for you. Expensive valves though!
For the remote piece, do you have ethernet or wifi available at the site?
No motor driving required, these devices have motor and motor controller and logic
built-in. The DC ones take a 4..20mA current loop control or a 0..10V voltage control,
and I can't figure out if these are separate options or combined in some way. You get
limit switches too to confirm action.
I'm trying to do the same thing you're doing. You should check these valves out. They're about $250 less!
A friendly put me on the right search path; though using the Motor shield to operate reverse polarity seems like an interesting option for the valves I've specified.
the key here is the comm link to the arduino from your remote site.
you need to make sure it is password protected so no one tried to take control.
the control of the valve is the easy part. just an on/off signal to the relay.
since it has a spring return, there is nothing but power on or power off.
I would suggest mocking it up in your workshop with the low costs valves to make sure you have it wired correctly.
I did not see a note about spring return on the unit on amazon. you could just wire it through a DPDT relay.