Festo Wiring with a spike

[pitzoid]

"I have it wired where the positive goes to the M+ and the negative goes to the M- and I do have it wired correctly according to the festo diagram. I have the positive wired to positive and the ground wired straight to ground."

I'm not sure what the "festo diagram" for FIRST has in the way of wiring (I guess I could look it up), but when linking most power coils to a relay such as a Spike, you should include a diode across the terminals of the valve coil. Back EMF from firing the coil can actually produce a momentary static voltage higher on the negative side that will not let current flow so the pilot valve in the Festo won't actuate.

If you install the diode across the terminals, make sure the white line on it is on the "+" terminal. For that valve, the coil is very small, so any of the small
diodes at Radioshack will work fine.

If this doesn't help, the valve may be bad, but that is doubtful, FESTO are very high quality products.

BOB