"This the parrot that I built in about an hour from some scraps of copper I had laying around. I always wanted one but did'nt want to buy one. I don't think you absolutley must have one but if you have what it takes to make one why not......its really simple.
Again this is made from scraps so its dosen't look like a 125$ one either. There's prolly only 25$ worth of stuff here and a little Map gas torch is all it takes for copper this small. I haven't polished it yet so she'll shine but I'll get to it. I made the riser kinda high cause I dont know how much pressure it takes to lift the hydrometer but higher is better than shorter if theres a dought.
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looking good ! looks live you live in Florida too

i'm 1/2 way between orlando and daytona and you're right, gotta keep those ferments inside during the summer. i usually keep it in the spare bathroom tub

"Well this is my water test and as you can see the hydro is floating very high ( thats cause it water)
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Hey Heeler looking good. If you have a dish tub large enough to put that in get a gallon of distilled vinegar, about $2.00, and let it soak all the crud off your copper. Saves a lot of work.

"Thankyou for your imput on how to make my parrot easier to read, and you are right closer to the beak seems to do the trick. When I did a water test it seemed easy to read and now that I'm into a likker run and the top has been taken down by another 1/8th of an inch it seems better. I think the surface tension of water may hold it higher in the tube than ethanol but we'll see throughout the run.

And the suggestion of working with 2"" copper, well I AM speaking from experince. I am not a pro at soldiering so maybe that was my reasoning for so many leaks in my joints of 2"" still towers that I built. And again you are right - I was shocked how shitty my joints were with propane. But with the hotter burning gases well it just seemed to work better for me. Now if others can make it work for them ---great."

"Seems easy enough to read with the recent modification.
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"This is the look I'm going for, of course its not put together yet. I gotta make a Lowes run, not enough scraps left to finish this one. And still not sure how to make a really cool coil without kinks. I did'nt get any in the one shown but its 3/8ths and I'm thinking of going smaller for ease of working with it.
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The new one is looking sweet. I just rolled my tubing around a jar of sundried tomatoes i picked up at sobeys from a sale bin for a buck. Still haven't eaten them yet. I rolled it tight to the jar with each coil touching the last. I did that coil as practice for when i made my gramham condensor probably close to two years ago. I realized it was going to be to small so i threw it in the scraps bucket. When i went to make my parrot i saw it and figured i could use it someway. I just stretched it out like i did when i made my condensor. It seems to go better(for me) if i do them as a tight coil then stretch to length.
The tubing is 3/8 i believe. I noticed when i tried to roll the first stuff i had left over from making my first worm style condensor it kinked like crazy. In my experience the dull luster stuff just doesn't roll well. You have to get the really shiny stuff. That kind of sounds dumb i know but it seems true. I think the really shiny stuff that doesn't lose its luster is maybe intended for A/C installs. Possibly tubing as opposed to pipe. Home Depot here sells both types in coiled rolls. The stuff in your picture looks to me like the harder to roll stuff that always wants to kink.

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You can see that little tube up top and thats a vent - its a must so the hydro does'nt bounce. The expanding air has to go somewhere and that tube vents the tower. You can also see I added a little valve on the bottom of the riser tube and my thinking was, fill the tube at first and that amount will be foreshots ( i bet) then drain it off and start to collect the heads. I also drained one tube full that I thought was the start of the heads and then I started useing jars. I find out in the morn how much heads I still have to toss. "