Foretravel Owners' Forum For owners and Fans of Foretravel Motorcoaches September 10, 2025 ...

The Redhat valve is a simple direct acting valve that will pull a lot of power (around 1 amp) and will not work for a double acting air cylinder or even a single acting cylinder.
The OEM valves (SMC/Norgeren) are called "piloted" in that a very tiny solenoid allows a tiny amount of air to push on a diaphragm that opens the main valve.  These require only about .12 amps or less but need a minimum amount of pressure to activate the main valve (around 30 psi). 
FT used a manifolded two valve set up for both the step and the stepwell cover.  It saved them an extra connection for the input air and mounting for only one device (vs. two).  It also allows for easier replacement if a valve goes bad.  The idea is you just disconnect the electrical plug (unscrew the screw) and pull the connection "cube" off.  Then there should be two (long and very small) screws (usually on a diagonal) that you remove and the valve should lift off the manifold.  Usually manifolds are for a setup with many valves, not just two: SMC Corporation - SS5Y3-41P-12-N7T - flat ribbon conn 12 station base mt bar...  The trick though is finding the right replacement now that the original valve is obsolete.  I'm guessing there is a current valve that will work but figuring their catalog is difficult to say the least.  There are hundreds of variations in their catalog for this family of valves.  SMC makes good stuff but it is hard to figure out the right P/N. http://www.smcpneumatics.com/pdfs/VQZ_5PT.pdf
When you look at the P/N you need to distinguish between the manifold block and the valve itself too.  It looks like the valve numbers are VQZ2151-6Y and VQZ2351-6Y from your photos.

Another option is to replace the entire valve manifold with two separate new valves:

For the step a single solenoid is all that is required: Amico 5 Way 2 Position DC 12V 3W 120mA Solenoid Valve 4V210-08: Industrial...
and connects like this : http://i0.wp.com/cdn.makezine.com/uploads/2014/10/tct-figc.jpg

Seeing the double solenoid tells me the user's switch control is probably a 3 position switch that is spring loaded to the middle position?
I think this valve would be a good replacement: DC 12V 4V230C-08 3 Position 5 Way Pneumatic Solenoid Valve: Industrial...  (I think) The double solenoid cuts air automatically (with the release of the switch) to the air cylinder so no leaking at the cylinder should result with this setup - an improvement over older systems with a single solenoid.

Of course this will require new wiring connections to be made and probably some air fitting connections changed out too, as well as mounting each of the new valves.  I would probably take this route if it were me since ordering the exact right SMC valve might be hard to do as well as expensive.  SMC stuff is generally sold to industrial customers.  24 vdc is the common industrial voltage too - not 12 vdc.

The exhaust ports on the valves usually will have valves to control the speed of the cylinders motion.  I can't tell if you can reuse these from the current setup or not.  You can control the speed in each direction with each exhaust valve.  These valves will have a muffler too sometimes - as I think I can see in your picture.
The pressure governs the force of the cylinder - which you want to keep it as light as possible in case a finger or toe gets caught.