Flo by Moen Good Water Monitor and Shutoff Evaluation
This site contains affiliate links. I may earn a small commission, at no extra cost to you.
Does the Flo by Moen Good Water Monitor and Shutoff reside as much as its good water moniker? That’s what we not too long ago got down to do by putting in the most recent model of the Flo by Moen shutoff system in our Digitized Home Evaluation good dwelling. The system not solely screens and categorizes water utilization all through the house to assist promote water conservation, however extra importantly presents realtime leak detection and computerized major waterline shutoff within the occasion of a significant leak occasion. Learn on to get our in-depth overview.
Evaluation Abstract
The Flo by Moen Good Water Monitor and Shutoff is a perfect water community security web for householders wanting to watch whole-home water utilization, observe water conservation, and defend their houses from catastrophic water harm. We had been impressed by its general clean operation via a number of weeks of testing on our water community, stable construct high quality, respectable accuracy in monitoring and measuring utilization, and general ease of use. We extremely suggest it.
Execs
Holistic whole-home water utilization monitoring by broad system class
Realtime reporting of water utilization and water stress
In depth depth and customization for alerts and notifications
Automated, on the spot shutoff of water mainline within the occasion of a significant leak
Dependable app entry for shutting down water mainline anytime/anyplace
Stable construct high quality
Cons
Restricted granular fixture/system class detection
Water occasion class modifying doesn’t essentially carry over to future occasions
Water utilization reporting restricted to the previous 7 days in Moen app
Comparatively excessive price, starting from $499 to $799 relying on mainline measurement. Reductions could also be obtainable at Moen or Amazon
Buy
Purchase Now: From Moen ($475-760)
Purchase Now: From Amazon (399-$560)
The Good Water Monitoring and Automated Shutoff Panorama
Flo by Moen has been available in the market for just a few years, and competes with comparable whole-home water monitoring and automatic shutoff merchandise provided by Phyn, Kohler, and others. The Phyn Plus Good Water Assistant + Shutoff (2nd gen) and Kohler H2Wise+ most likely most intently align with Flo by Moen with respect to options, capabilities, utilization mannequin, and worth vary. The Phyn and Kohler choices, by the way in which, are basically the identical product (see our detailed overview on the Kohler H2Wise+), although the Kohler-branded model brings some further intelligence when used with Kohler-branded plumbing fixtures.
What are you able to count on with this style of good water gadgets? First, since they set up on the principle water line coming into the house, you possibly can count on to get water utilization and historical past by fixture sort for gadgets related upstream of the monitor, in addition to water stress monitoring. Secondly, you possibly can count on automated every day well being checks of your plumbing system (or water community, as we prefer to consult with it) to detect for failing parts or microleaks. Thirdly, because of the built-in shutoff mechanism, they will robotically flip off the water major within the occasion of a catastrophic leak to forestall or decrease water harm to the construction. And lastly, you possibly can count on anyplace, anytime app entry to examine on water utilization, overview alerts and notifications, and to remotely swap off your water major with the swipe of a finger.
With reference to fixture sort, the central good sensors in these screens are designed to make use of algorithms and AI to find plumbing fixtures after which place them into significant system teams or classes for reporting. So, whereas they fight their greatest to accurately establish these gadgets, don’t count on them to be solely good on this regard.
Learn on to find how the Flo by Moen product does on these expectations.
Flo by Moen Evaluation: Out of the Field
Moen presents the Flo system in 3 totally different mainline sizes, together with 3/4 in., 1 in., and 1.25-in, differentiating itself from the Phyn and Kohler merchandise which are solely obtainable in a 1-in. measurement. Typically, you’ll want to choose a measurement that’s the identical or bigger than your mainline in order to not impede water circulate or trigger diminished stress. Advised retail price for Flo vary from $499 to $799 relying on the mainline measurement, however you possibly can count on some stage of low cost instantly from Moen, Amazon, and different on-line retailers.
Within the case of Flo, the general dimensions of the valve housing and clearances required round it enhance proportionally with mainline measurement, so additionally preserve that in thoughts when choosing one on your dwelling. We reviewed the largest-available 1.25-in. model, however if you’re tight on house think about using the three/4 in. or 1 in. variations.
The Flo Shutoff valve housing itself is molded in navy blue, and hides the electronics, Wi-Fi radio, and the waterway with a motorized ball valve that’s employed to manage water circulate. A inexperienced thumb activate the entrance of the valve signifies the place of the ball valve: when the thumb flip is parallel to the water circulate the valve is open; when perpendicular to the water circulate it’s closed. The ball valve itself is chrome plated to advertise lengthy life.
The waterway encompasses a plastic turbine on its outboard port, which is used to precisely measure water circulate and utilization.
Additionally included within the field are an short-term plastic spacer to be used throughout set up, an influence adapter with 10-foot cable, energy adapter wall bracket, and wall anchors for the bracket. Do take into accout the Flo valve itself doesn’t make the most of a bracket, so its weight have to be absolutely supported by the encompassing plumbing system. A postcard containing a QR code encoded with the unit serial quantity and MAC handle are additionally included, and are used when initially pairing the system with the required Moen Good Water Community telephone app.
Total, the Flo setup is properly thought out and seems to be ruggedly constructed. The 1.25-in valve is sort of heavy, largely because of its bodily measurement, motorized 1.25-in. ball valve shutoff mechanism, and stable brass fittings and tailpieces.
Flo by Moen Evaluation: Set up and Setup
Bodily set up of the Flo Shutoff is greatest dealt with by a licensed plumber, because it requires turning off the water provide and chopping into the mainline plumbing itself, and moreover could require extra twists and turns of plumbing to accommodate it. Nonetheless, typically the method is simple within the occasion you wish to undertake this as a DIY challenge and have the requisite plumbing instruments and expertise.
Moen does supply rough-in kits to plumbers and DIYers in numerous sizes and configurations that may be bought prematurely of the Flo by Moen Shutoff itself. These kits embrace an inline spacer and numerous fittings that exactly match the end-to-end dimensions of the Flo valve, and could be helpful throughout new building or remodels the place future set up of the valve is desired. The rough-in kits are designed to allow on a regular basis water circulate and may be left in place indefinitely. As soon as the rough-in items have been put in and examined, a future set up of the Flo valve is a comparatively easy course of.
Within the case of our retrofit set up, we had a 1-in. mainline so bought a pair of stainless-steel 1.25 x 1.0 bushings to adapt the 1.25-in. brass tailpieces at each ends of the Flo valve to a 1-in. NPT threaded pipe measurement. And since our system is 100% plumbed with versatile PEX plastic water strains and fittings, we additionally bought SharkBite adapter fittings to make the ultimate transitions from threaded NPT pipe to PEX pipe. On this style there was no must solder any joints.
The Flo valve may be put in both horizontally or vertically. In our case, because of the current location of the principle water shutoff valve and its proximity to a water softener system, we elected to create a brand new S-shaped plumbing route so the Flo valve may very well be put in vertically. After we turned off the principle water valve, we severed the incoming water line, then used brass SharkBite quick-connect fittings and brief lengths of PEX pipe to style the brand new plumbing route. Moreover, we used C-shaped conduit clamps on the prime and backside of the brand new plumbing part to assist the added weight of the pipe, fittings, and the Flo valve.
To wrap up the plumbing section, we put in the equipped Flo spacer as a placeholder for the Flo valve, then turned the mainline again on to check the system for leaks. After caring for just a few minor drips within the brass parts of the system through the use of teflon tape, we turned off the water once more and changed the spacer with the Flo valve. Lastly, we mounted the ability adapter above the valve and related its cable to the highest of the valve, then adopted the guided directions within the Moen app to attach the valve to WiFi and full the set up. After just a few moments, the inexperienced LEDs on the highest of the valve got here alive and the Flo was seen on the app dwelling display screen.
Among the many preliminary setup duties is configuring the Residence Traits panel. Right here, specifics round dwelling measurement, variety of occupants, and water consumption targets are set. One click on down, the Home equipment & Facilities panel allows checking off the kind of indoor and outside fixtures, home equipment, and different facilities current within the dwelling. The Flo system will then take this info into consideration because it makes an attempt to correctly categorize utilization.
Video: Watch Flo by Moen in Motion
Flo by Moen Evaluation: The way it Works
Startup and Studying Mode
As soon as Flo by Moen is up and working, it instantly begins measuring complete dwelling water utilization via its inside sensors and drops into Studying Mode—per week or so of AI-enhanced studying on the fly. Throughout this preliminary coaching interval, the automated shutoff function is disabled and the My Flo Modes—together with Residence, Sleep, and Away states—are disabled as properly. At this stage, the system is making educated choices on particularly what sort of system or gadgets are consuming water at any time limit. It does this by sensing and dissecting the water circulate, water stress, and occasion length footprint and matching that in opposition to its data base of gadgets.
The aim after all is to measure and categorize water utilization as intently as potential, whereas studying concerning the typical water utilization occasions occurring each day. In doing so, the system intends to distinguish between regular water utilization occasions and potential uncommon occasions (e.g. people who could point out a leak or excessive circulate occasion). In these uncommon circumstances, the automated mainline water shutoff function could also be activated immediately to forestall catastrophic water harm, or a notification could also be raised within the app so the home-owner can decide on the best way to deal with it.
Realtime Monitoring and Instantaneous Shutoff
From the second it’s turned on, the Flo by Moen sensors start monitoring realtime water use in gallons per minute (GPM) and water stress (PSI), in addition to logging each water occasion. An occasion could also be one thing so simple as a rest room flush or momentary opening and shutting of a faucet, or longer and extra complicated occasions similar to baths, showers, panorama irrigation, or water softener regeneration. In every occasion case, the system logs the system sort/class, date and time, length in minutes and seconds, and water quantity.
Within the Moen app dwelling display screen, a Complete Residence Controls part seems when the Flo is added, and most significantly, the Flo Shutoff swap is entrance and heart so you possibly can remotely and immediately flip the water major on or off from right here. We are saying immediately since that’s exactly the way it occurs: inside just a few seconds of tapping the button, Flo will spin up its motor, and with a servo-like whir the ball valve rotates 90 levels to close off the water major.
The My Flo Modes are additionally selectable from the Complete Residence Controls part.
-
Moen Good Water Community app, exhibiting tiles for Flo by Moen features. A guide mainline shutoff may be achieved immediately from right here by tapping the Flo Shutoff button. -
Flo by Moen dwelling display screen, depicting realtime water stress, circulate price, and outdoors temperature meters, in addition to development knowledge.
The Pleasure of Stats
In the event you’ve by no means skilled whole-home water monitoring, you might be in for some surprises and shocks. Shock! Who knew somebody within the dwelling was taking 45-minute showers and utilizing 60+ gallons of water every time? With Flo by Moen, you’ll have the ability to see these leisurely bathe occasions within the Moen app, together with the beginning time, length, and gallons used—in case you wish to do some sleuthing to find out the responsible occasion. Shock! Did you actually know the way a lot water your family was utilizing day by day? Most likely not. Your new water knowledge supply is a far cry from the mundanity of a month-to-month water invoice.
Moen presents loads of choices on the best way to examine water utilization. For a snapshot of realtime utilization, simply faucet the Flo Shutoff tile from the app dwelling display screen, and from the Overview panel you will get present water stress, circulate price, and space temperature readings via speedometer-type meters. Beneath the meters, you will get Sensor Tendencies, line charts for circulate price, stress, and temperature plotted for the final 7 days, final 24 hours, or realtime.
On the Utilization tab, cumulative water utilization for the day or week are seen in a meter and accompanying bar chart, whereas rolled-up Utilization By Fixture (or class) over the chosen interval seems under that.
-
Flo by Moen Utilization panel, exhibiting week-to-date complete precise water utilization versus aim (set by person within the app). -
Flo by Moen Historical past panel, exhibiting final 7 day utilization by fixture class. -
Flo by Moen app Historical past, exhibiting bathe occasions over earlier week. -
Flo by Moen app Historical past display screen, depicting occasions by class. Particular person occasions may be edited to replicate the right fixture/system producing the utilization.
However essentially the most telling info lies within the Historical past panel. Right here, fixtures and classes are extra finely segregated, and particular person classes may be expanded to disclose all particular person occasions and their particulars. Once more, the metrics at this occasion stage embrace date, time, length, and water quantity.
How correct was Flo at correctly figuring out and categorizing the plumbing gadgets on our water community? On the whole, it did an admirable job at putting gadgets into broad classes, similar to Faucet, Bathe, and Bathroom. For gadgets it couldn’t particularly establish, it tended to put them right into a common Home equipment class—this catch-all classification included issues similar to dishwashers, in-door water dispensers, craft ice makers, washing machines, pot fillers, water softeners, and different gadgets.
Moreover, whereas it’s not evident from the person interface, every particular person water occasion may be tapped to allow modifying of its fixture or class. As an illustration, if you already know a selected Bathe occasion was certainly a Backyard Hose occasion, you possibly can faucet the Flawed Fixture button and choose the proper one. Flo ideally would then have the ability to correctly categorize comparable occasions sooner or later. Following modifying, the precise occasion will seem underneath its new class, with subtext indicating the earlier class. This knowledge was additionally mirrored within the reporting instruments.
In observe, nonetheless, we discovered that after modifying an occasion to replicate a brand new system sort, Flo was typically not capable of accurately establish the system the subsequent time it was used.
My Flo Modes
The My Flo Modes are selectable from the Moen app dwelling display screen, and are primarily designed to regulate how and when the automated shutoff function works. These modes work as follows:
- Residence Mode: The conventional mode for day-to-day use. Residence Mode brings the common stage of leak and utilization safety, together with alarm notifications for higher-than-normal utilization and computerized water shutoff enablement. You’ll sometimes get an alert or notification earlier than Flo takes any drastic motion round shutting off the water.
- Away Mode: The mode to make use of when you’re away for an prolonged time period or on trip. Away Mode brings an extra stage of leak and utilization safety by studying what utilization is like whenever you’re away. On this mode, Flo can immediately set off an computerized shutoff when it detects larger than regular utilization or when it thinks a significant leak has occurred.
- Sleep Mode: This mode isn’t what you assume. Sleep Mode merely ignores all proactive and real-time assessments and silences all alarm notifications, and is designed to be used when irregular water utilization is predicted like filling a swimming pool or spa, or having a number of visitors keep over. So whenever you are sleeping, make sure to use Residence mode.
Alerts, Notifications, and Well being Checks
Flo can generate myriad alerts and notifications through textual content message, e-mail, telephone name, or in-app when in Residence or Away mode primarily based on extraordinarily granular settings within the Flo Notifications panel. The alternatives are intensive in each modes, and are categorized into Crucial Alerts, Warning Alerts, and Data Alerts. In all, there are 27 particular person settings for Residence mode and one other 27 settings for Away mode. Beneath every of these, you possibly can individually choose in or out of textual content, e-mail, name or in-app notifications. Suffice it to say, you’ll wish to rigorously overview these to make sure you are getting what you want on your scenario.
Flo additionally gives what they name FloSense, a worldwide alert sensitivity setting. A slider with a variety from Much less Alerts to Extra Alerts dictates how the system will reply with alert notifications when uncommon exercise is detected. So in the event you discover you might be nonetheless getting too many alerts, simply crank down this setting.
Flo has additionally built-in a plumbing well being examine function, known as MicroLeak Check. By default, this common plumbing well being examine runs as soon as per day by robotically turning off the water major and monitoring for any leaks or abnormalities within the pressurized system. After it runs its course over a span of two to 4 minutes, the water major is turned again on and outcomes get reported primarily based on its settings within the Notifications panel.
To check this function, we opened a faucet to supply a circulate of about 1/10 gallon per minute then initiated a guide MicroLeak Check. The check instantly detected the water circulate and raised an alert within the app, noting a ten.79% drop in water stress. The app advised we examine all of the fixtures in the home to ensure they had been tightly closed and sealed.
Leak Detection and Automated Shutoff
Moen says leaks as small as one drip per minute may be detected. We weren’t capable of confirm that, however we had been capable of simulate a bigger “leak” in our water community.
In our testing, we simulated an Away Mode leak and computerized shutoff state of affairs. First, we set FloSense to most sensitivity. Secondly, we adjusted Away Mode Notifications to set off immediately and instantly notify when any surprising water use was detected, and lastly, we put the Flo into Away mode.
Then, all that was left was to activate some water, so we opened a toilet sink faucet. Immediately, we obtained a textual content indicating surprising water utilization, and instantly we may hear the whir of the Flo because it activated its shutoff valve and turned off the water. This all occurred inside a handful of seconds.
Guide Shutoff
Within the occasion of an influence outage or community outage, the Flo shutoff valve can nonetheless be operated manually through the use of the included hex wrench. The thumb flip have to be absolutely depressed previous to rotating it clockwise the required 90 levels to open or shut the valve.
Flo by Moen Evaluation: Integrations
Flo by Moen can combine with a number of good dwelling ecosystems, together with Amazon Alexa, Google Residence, Good, Ring, and Alarm.com. However don’t count on too many options to be uncovered via these integrations.
By the use of instance, we examined the Google Residence integration—however performance was restricted to controlling the open/shut place of the shutoff valve, in addition to the mode selector. Nonetheless, this minimal stage of integration is typical for Google Residence and should not absolutely signify different platforms.
Flo by Moen Evaluation: What’s Lacking and a Few Points
Flo by Moen is mostly very properly thought out and operates with no hitch. Nonetheless, whereas the reporting via the advisable Moen Good Water Community app is intensive, you possibly can solely overview knowledge from the previous week. For instance, there isn’t a facility to view the historical past of earlier months, or to check August of this yr to August of final yr.
In equity to Moen, if you would like extra in-depth reporting by week, month, or yr, you possibly can elect to make use of the standalone Flo by Moen app as an alternative. Flo additionally presents an internet interface, with intensive controls and comparable deep reporting.
On points, few had been encountered and so they had been typically minor. Over the month or in order that we performed our testing, we often skilled sluggishness when launching the Moen Good Water Community app. In these circumstances, the house display screen failed to attract, doubtless attributable to community points. A relaunch of the app just a few moments later sometimes resolved these points. Additionally, when cycle testing the Flo shutoff valve by repeatedly tapping the open/shut button within the app, the app stopped responding. We relaunched the app and rebooted the valve after these incidents and all gave the impression to be advantageous.
The Backside Line: A Water Community Security Internet
The Flo by Moen Good Water Monitor and Shutoff is a perfect water community security web for householders wanting to watch whole-home water utilization, observe water conservation, and defend their houses from catastrophic water harm. We had been impressed by its general clean operation via a number of weeks of testing on our water community, stable construct high quality, respectable accuracy in monitoring and measuring utilization, and general ease of use. We extremely suggest it.
