Finally built a parrot

[Steve Broady]

Nothing too original here, but I felt like sharing. I was inspired by a parrot built by BourbonJunkie, and finally got around to building my own. It’s a 1” pipe body and 3/8” tubing, and a 1”x1.5” coupling for the collector.

I started by drilling and flaring a hole in the coupling to fit the tubing. I had to anneal the copper to get the flare formed.

I cut one end of the 1” pipe at an angle, then cut notches in it to accept the tubing while leaving it sitting around 1/8” proud. I also drilled out a 1/4”x1/8” NPT bushing to fit on the tubing, then soldered everything together.

Once that was cooled, I ground away a little more than half the tubing inside the pipe so that liquid can flow freely between the two.

I flattened a scrap of pipe and formed a trough in it so that it fit neatly over the tubing, then soldered it in place.

Of course there was plenty of filing and sanding to clean everything up and make it look nice. The rest of the build is pretty self explanatory, but I will say it was a bit of a challenge to solder all the joints without overheating the ones I’d already done.

Now to clean it up and put it to work.

[Yummyrum]

Looks the goods Steve
Is the valve able to be removed if needed or is it effectively soldered in place ?

[Northsouth]

And it is a pretty one. Congrats on your patience and skill!

[Steve Broady]

Is the valve able to be removed if needed or is it effectively soldered in place ?

Yes

It’s captive, but not soldered. If I need to remove it, I could cut the outlet pipe and unscrew it.

[Rusty Ole Bucket]

Nice looking parrot Steve, great job. I've been thinking about building one for stripping runs, but I still like the ritual of swapping the jars.

Rusty

[Steve Broady]

Nice looking parrot Steve, great job. I've been thinking about building one for stripping runs, but I still like the ritual of swapping the jars.

Rusty

To be honest, I’ve never seen the point. Especially for stripping runs, the only proof I bother checking is the average of the low wines. And for a spirit run on a pot still, I get what I get and worry about it at the end.

But this is for a continuous still where I actually need to know the proof as it comes off the spout, which is why I built it. It’s also going to double up as a trap to keep vapor from being able to blow out even if I open the LM valve wide open.

Practicality aside, I’ve really enjoyed building this and making it look nice.

[Rusty Ole Bucket]

Nice looking parrot Steve, great job. I've been thinking about building one for stripping runs, but I still like the ritual of swapping the jars.

Rusty

To be honest, I’ve never seen the point. Especially for stripping runs, the only proof I bother checking is the average of the low wines. And for a spirit run on a pot still, I get what I get and worry about it at the end.

But this is for a continuous still where I actually need to know the proof as it comes off the spout, which is why I built it. It’s also going to double up as a trap to keep vapor from being able to blow out even if I open the LM valve wide open.

Practicality aside, I’ve really enjoyed building this and making it look nice.

Ah, ok, I understand. The enjoyment is the important part!

Rusty