On Sat, 12 Mar 2011 14:26:59 -0500, Nate Nagel
wrote:

Hi all

I am messing with TWO Moen "Chateau" single handle faucets with side
sprayers, with what I believe are similar problems. One I bought new at
my house, and was handed it in a box when I went to clean out because

When you went to clean out???

"the diverter was bad and I had a handyman replace it" (as I was told.

A tenant told you this?

I was not present to observe exactly what prompted the replacement.)
The other is installed in my friend's house.

The one that is still installed has had problems with the side sprayer.
Based on the deposits that I see on it, they have hard water. The
issue is that the sprayer does not stop spraying when you release the
trigger.
**

I took the sprayer from the old faucet from my house and
installed it on his hose and that one works better, but it still
dribbles water when the trigger is released, it does not completely shut
off.**

This leads me to believe that the diverter valve is not
functioning on THIS faucet as well.

**The dribbling woudl be because the sprayer valve is bad, no? Not
the diverter valve. If so, they sell heads separately. All white,
all black, black with silver trim, and one other, maybe all silver.
Six dollars at HD for a couple of those styles. Other styles at Ace,
but the one at HD matched my old one perfectly. (mine was not coming
out the opening but dribbling down from under the sprayer, down the
hose, and I had to pull the hose out to keep it from going under the
sink. Oh yeah, that's what you're talking about.

Isn't the dirverter valve under the main faucet, not the on/off valve
in the sprayer? I thought the diverter valve was meant, when the
sprayer was on, to stop any flow of water to the faucet itself, to
increase pressure to the sprayer, which would otherwise be less than
half of the original pressure.

Come to think, it wasn't the on/off valve that leaked. It was the
connection to the hose. There were two washers and a small metal ring
to hold one or both washers in place. The big black washer was soft
and should have worked when the sparyer halves were tightened
together, but the big black washer on the replacement was even softer,
and that made the difference. If I had a big black washer like that,
or even one I think with a bigger center hole, that woudl have been
all I needed, but if I do have anything like that, it's probably 10 or
20 yeasrs old. Maybe they sell them separately, but I'm happy to have
the thing fixed and didn't understnad the problem when I was at the
store.


Currently they've been using it
with the sprayer just left hanging in one bowl of the sink, but that to
me is an inelegant solution and I'd like to fix it.

Me too. But I don't even know where they live.

Does this sound reasonable? Both faucets failed quite "young," mine
maybe two years after installation, my friend's less than a year.

I do have both of the side sprayers currently soaking in glasses full of
vinegar right now in an attempt to free them up...

If it's leaking betwween the sprayer and the hose, it's leaking, not
clogged, and your vinegar is meant to remove deposits in the sprayer,
not where it attaches to the hose. Wait, yours is only one year old?
If it's the wwasher it should still be soft, maybe you can scrape the
deposits off the faces of the washer with a pen knife, any sharp
non-serrated knife, if there are any.

You never said where it was leaking.

nate

The talk about the noise of the diverter valve is distracting you
fronm the leak, which is your friend's problem. well, if the sprayer
never totally closes, maybe htat's why the diverter doesn't make that
noise. Holding your thumb over the hose totally closes the sprayer
output. Letting go of the sprayer trigger with the leaky washer
doeesn't.