Thoughts on GCC cages?

So, after a month of grinding us through the ringer, it looks as if our home purchase is actually going to go through. We'll have a bit less cash to play around with fixing it up than we had hoped, the seller was a real PITA and refused to cover even all the code-related repairs, but at least we got him close to what we think it is going to cost. But c'est la guerre.

One of the things on my list of things to do in the longer term is to get Scooter a bigger cage, one that has more horizontal space. Not only is his current cage a bit small IMO, but while it has a lot of nice features, it also has some not so nice ones. The spring tension bolts are constantly getting out of adjustment making it hard to open and close doors, and the design has lots of metal crevices seed and fruit debris can get stuck in, which are hard to get out even with a hose. Plus the seed guard layers in with tabs and it gets bumped out of adjustment often. I don't want to ditch the seed guard because it does catch at least a fraction of the mess. Scooter cleans his beak via the head-fling method when eating fresh food...Also for some reason they designed it so the playtop uses a different paper size than the main cage tray, and I wind up stocking precut liners in 4 sizes for 3 cages.

So I've been looking at cages and I'm just not finding "the perfect cage". I was tempted to give him the one we got for Blanco, but it will not work IMO. For several reasons.... the bars are not sturdy enough, they are quite bendy... there are no outside access feeder doors which is OK for me but likely not a sitter, he can be a bit of a land shark... and the latches I think he'd crack in two seconds flat. Also, no seed guard, and with the fruit spatter I'd definitely prefer one for him. And no playtop, which he also quite enjoys. So while I like the size, I don't really think it's quite the thing for Scooter. It's ideal for Blanco, though!

The ones in catalogs I've looked at that have the kind of size I'd like typically have wider bar spacing than seems ideal for a GCC. I have to keep reminding myself he's actually smaller than Blanco, because he seems a lot bigger! His beak is definitely way more powerful. So how wide is it safe to go for a GCC? His current cage is 1/2". Many of the ones I like are 3/4", some 5/8". I assume 1" is right out. Scotty's is 3/4" and that would be more than adequate, but I think that's just a bit too much space between bars.

What do you have for your GCC?

Oh, the things we do for our fids...

Poe's current cage is 5/8" bar spacing, the new ones coming in on Saturday for both of them will be 1/2" bar spacing.

We haven't had any trouble with the 5/8", but 3/4" sounds REALLY big considering his itty bitty head....