Bio-Chem Valve Inc. has designed a 3-way dual solenoid valve designed to offer the flexibility and speed to select desired pathway combinations for efficient, low-cost flow switching. A manufacturer of precision dispensing syringe systems needed a special valve that could be assembled on top of multiple syringes, and mounted side-by-side while functioning in traditional aspirate and dispense modes as well as a wash cycle. Speed and flexibility were also necessary to accommodate changing requirements and fast needle cleaning. When standard valves were not able to perform as desired, the manufacturer contacted Bio-Chem Valve Inc. to develop a custom-modified version of an existing valve product. The traditional round valve bodies with ports positioned at 90 degrees did not allow efficient side-by-side mounting, and the standard 3-way valve configurations with one normally-closed, one normally-open, and one common port, were not able to handle the wash cycle requirement in which the normally-open and normally-closed ports both need to be open at the same time.
Bio-Chem Valve engineers developed a small footprint valve solution that handles the multiple tasks. The resultant dual-solenoid, 3-way valve features a rectangular body design that is capable of switching on demand to allow independent operation of each inlet port. The 4 possible on/off combinations between the normally-open and normally-closed ports (both on, both off, on/off, off/on) meet the wash cycle requirement. In addition to meeting the size and performance requirements, the new valve also saves on power usage, circuitry and number of controls.