Aprilaire 112, water orifice and media insert

[SpencerPJ]

I’ve got an old Aprilaire 112 with fan that seems to work fine. Over the years, I’ve always regulated the water flow with the water valve not thinking much about it. Then I did a complete clean job, replaced the media etc and noticed that the water line does not have the screen or red orifice water restrictor at the solenoid (hence why I’ve had to regulate the water flow)

Questions:
1. Any reason why the red orifice is necessary (other than the above dilemma) ?
2. What should the water dripping out be like? drip…. drip… drip… or drip, drip, drip, or a stream of water?
3. I bought one of those new type media replacements that have a papery coating over the screen media, (supposedly for better water distribution/absorption).
Has anyone used one of these newer screen medias? Thoughts??

Thanks