Solenoid Control Valve Question

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Hello Everyone,

First off, I'm an extreme noob when it comes to pneumatics, so I apologize for any stupid questions.

My question for today is that my team is having a little bit of trouble with the kicker.

We're using cylinder with a 9" stroke and I believe a 2" bore. We're trying to use the festo solenoid control valves that were provided in the kits. Actually, I think we're using the '09 valves.

We can't seem to get a decent kick out of the system. Now an obvious change was to use a cylinder with a smaller bore and a shorter stroke, but some of our mentors also suggested getting a valve with a large flow rate.

Now, I'm wondering those of you who are using pneumatic kickers, what kinds of valves are you having success with? Or if you are using pneumatics, which valve would you recommend?