Moen, where have you been this last decade?

A decade ago when we renovated and moved into our home, I got a faucet from Rona that was on sale. I remember it being a Moen but at some point, I took off the handle and looked at the cartridge realizing that it’s an American Standard brand one. It worked but there were three things that we were not great about it.

First was that the nozzle kept on getting loose and occasionally spraying all over including us.

Second, the flow rate was low and slow.

Third, the nooks and crannies made it hard to keep clean.

The cartridge finally started to go a year ago and I forgot again that it isn’t a Moen and bought the wrong cartridge for it based on the pictures. I tried to take it apart to get a look at the cartridge again but this time the screw was seized and I ended up breaking 2 hex keys trying to get at it and I also melted the plastic cover trying to use heat to coax it to loosen. We started watching for sales and this Moen Mali 1 came up.

It was a drop in replacement and I think concerns number 2 and 3 above are not concerns at all with this thing. Especially number 2 and having good pressure and flow. For number 1, hopefully time will tell but it does look a lot more robust than the other one. For anyone else looking for a household kitchen faucet, spend the money and at least get a Moen.