Piston with off-center barrel?

[sharpshooter]

Has anyone ever built a piston valve with an off-center valve seat? I am going for a twin barrel configuration, and I want them as close together as possible. But i don't want to use elbows, as that will increase dead volume, and introduce turbulence to the flow.

My gut says this should be a non issue, assuming of course that the piston is long enough to resist the twisting forces created by an off center load (at least 1:2 dia:length). But we are talking several hundred pounds here if I run at 200psi, and a 1.5-2" dia piston.

Here's a quick mock up of a small section of barrel/chambers:


(please don't dwell on the sizes/ratios involved here... I just picked some random pipe sizes for this illustration)

[jrrdw]

It will work. The only issue that I foresee is a wear pattern causing a sealing problem once a wear pattern is created.

I'll take 'floating seals' for 500 Alex..... :bigsmurf: