I bought a 1" sprinkler valve from my local Ho Depot, I mean Home Depot that looked very similar to the one in the How to, but it's apparently not the same since I can't get it to work right. All of the valves have the center pin at this store. Anyway, it's a Lawn Genie model # 54004 and it had the center pin attached in the top, when I drilled it out for the air fitting i drilled out the pin and it seems like it wants to work but only intermittently, i tried plugging the center hole in the diaphragm and that mad it worse. what am i missing and do i need a new valve? Please help this is for a time limited project.

Any chance you can take a picture? I know it's easier for me to figure out things with a picture

Hey i had this same problem, what you wanna do is either:
1) Get a higher flowing blogun/ball valve
2) Get a paperclip and put it into the center hole (You need a little airflow through the hole, but not too much.)

Or do both.