Enhanced Safety with

H Series ISO Valve Manifold

White Paper
Enhanced Safety with the H Series
ISO Valve Manifold

Integrating safety circuits into machine design is no easy task.

The more functionality provided in the components you select
the easier integration becomes. Parker has taken great strides to
increase efficiency through design while making safety integration
easier. This whitepaper illustrates what you can do to enhance the
efficiency and safety of your next machine design.

Let’s start with redundancy. Redundancy is required to achieve

Linda Caron
CMSE ®, Certified Machinery
Safety Expert (TÜV Nord),
Global Product Manager,
Factory Automation
Parker Hannifin Corporation
Pneumatic Division
higher levels of safety such as Cat 3 and Cat 4 (two channel)
applications. Often single channel safety is only required however;
more machine designers are adding redundancy as a matter of
good design principles and to ensure the integrity of the safe
function for fail-safe operation. Modern valve manifolds offer more
options than ever before to allow safety integration. Here are a few
examples of features that you can incorporate together for your
next machine application.

Safe Power Capable

Valve manifolds can be designed to accept safe power or standard power. Safe power comes from a reliable
safe power source (such as safe relay) and differs because it is designed for test pulse (OSSD) power which can
be supplied as auxiliary power from a safe output device following machine directives. In the example below,
safe power is utilized with a safety device (light curtain). When the light curtain is breached safe power is
removed but the valve is still able to communicate through the network.

7/8" Power Out

Ethernet
Parker has added a 7/8"
IO-Link
power out connector to Safe Power
the P2H IO-Link network Aux Power
node (valve driver). This
allows easy access to
power in a plant with a
standard industrial 7/8"
connector. Additionally,
this power out feature
can be used to daisy
chain the safe power to Pilot Exhaust Module
another product or valve
manifold. In the event
Safe power can be daisy
of a light curtain breach
chained or utilized as needed.
the safe power would
be turned off across
both the manifold and
all components daisy
chained to it.
Pilot Exhaust Module (PXM)
A pilot exhaust module with mechanical sensor (for feedback to PLC) is shown in the previous illustration.
When used with externally piloted valves this offers an enhanced means of bringing valves to a safe state. The
HA valve works in conjunction with the PXM to turn pilot on or off. When pilot is removed (turned off ) valves
will return to their home state or at rest position. This allows easy machine maintenance without exhausting
the main supply air in the manifold. The PXM can be used across the entire manifold or within a given zone
depending on how the valve is configured.

Zoning
Zoning (also known as module shaping) a valve manifold is simply a matter of dividing the manifold into
sections. This can be done electrically or pneumatically or both. It is common for each zone to have different
pressures (or vacuum) and to be configured for a unique section of the machine. Ie. Zone 1 feeds air to the
cutting line, zone 2 feeds air to the packaging line etc.

Pneumatic zoning involves adding a solid blocking gasket between the manifold
sections to create the next zone. Each zone operates independent of the others
and will have its own supply and exhaust. Parker have added “tabs” to the
blocking gaskets, so you can visually see where each zone starts and finishes.

Right Sizing
Right sizing is the ability to select the right valve size for the application and be able to mix those sizes on one
manifold. The Parker H Series valves offers this option as shown in the illustration. This will cover all cylinder
bore sizes with flow ranges from 0.5 to 6.0 Cv.
How it Can All Work Together
Efficiency
Tasked with machine design your first step is to find a valve manifold that meets your flow requirements
and price point. Right sizing can offer incredible cost savings both in components (don’t buy valves larger
than you need or two manifolds where one will do) and in air savings (compressed air is part of the cost of
ownership). If the machine can be sectioned into zones, then zoning the manifold has some merit. Zoning
will allow you to optimize the layout of the manifold and often reduce the plumbing of pneumatic lines for
a less cluttered machine.

Safety
Using safe power is a great line of defense. It can be used alone or with a safety device such as an e-stop,
light curtain or other device to trigger power off both on the manifold and across the plant if needed. The
7/8" Power out gives you options for quick power which is never a bad option to have without needing the
help of the electrical maintenance person.

Maintenance
Add the PXM to this design and you can bring the entire valve to an at rest position without losing main
supply pressure for safety or maintenance. This results in faster up time. Valve selection is important because
the externally piloted valves you select for this application will respond accordingly when pilot is removed.
• A 5/2 single solenoid (mechanical spring return) valve will return to the 12-operator state
• A 5/2 double solenoid valve will maintain last state
• A 5/3 valve will return to the center condition

Predictive Maintenance & Diagnostics

When designing a valve for a machine we recommend the migration to a networked solution over traditional
hardwired connectivity. Industrial Ethernet offers the advantage of diagnostics both cyclic (sent to the PLC)
and acyclic (stored in the memory of the node). Predictive maintenance becomes easier when you have
voltage warnings, cycle count information, short circuit notifications and thermal warnings and other key
critical pieces of data that help you make informed decisions to result in reduced downtime. This data is easy
to manage and retrieve via embedded webpages which also helps in the speed to integrate these products
into the network quickly.
Utilized together these options can form a safety circuit suitable for category rating to EN ISO 13849-1 and
ANSI ISO12100
For more information, add on instructions or function blocks for Parker products please visit:
www.parker.com/pdn/networkconnectivity

© 2019 Parker Hannifin Corporation PDNWP-012 January, 2020

Parker Hannifin Corporation

Pneumatic Division
8676 E. M89
Richland, MI 49083 USA
Tel: 269 629 5000
email: pdnapps@parker.com
www.parker.com/pneumatics