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ARS Home » Southeast Area » Stoneville, Mississippi » Cotton Ginning Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #178654
Title: NEW LINT CLEANER TO REDUCE FIBER LOSS AND DAMAGE

Author
item Anthony, William

Submitted to: ASAE Annual International Meeting
Publication Type: Proceedings
Publication Acceptance Date: 3/28/2005
Publication Date: 7/20/2005
Citation: Anthony, W.S. 2005. New lint cleaner to reduce fiber loss and damage. ASAE Annual International Meeting. Paper #51100 21 pp.

Interpretive Summary: Standard cleaners used to remove foreign matter from cotton lint at gins improve the appearance and market value of the cotton but reduce bale weight and degrade some desirable mill qualities. A new lint cleaner to mitigate these adverse features was designed, constructed, patented and compared to a standard lint cleaner in terms of fiber loss and fiber quality. Three separate studies were conducted using different varieties of cotton, different machine speeds, and improvements to the machine. Results indicated that similar fiber properties were obtained across machine treatments but the fiber loss was reduced about 50% by the experimental cleaner. Use of this machine in the cotton industry will increase cotton value by $6 per bale.

Technical Abstract: A new lint cleaner equipped with spiked cylinders and multiple saw cylinders was developed to improve fiber quality and reduce fiber waste (patent 6,539,585). The new cleaner consists of a modified cylinder cleaner combined with two lint cleaner saws as well as a secondary saw to prevent fiber lost. The new cleaner was evaluated in three operational studies. Study 1 considered one and two stages of saw-type lint cleaning with two varieties of cotton and two different pre-cleaning sequences. Study 2 considered two operational speeds and one and two stages of saw-type lint cleaning with two varieties of cotton. Study 3 considered two varieties of cotton. Treatment values for leaf grade were 3.7, 3.2 and 3.8, respectively, for one lint cleaner, two lint cleaners, and the new cleaner while length values were 2.774, 2.760 and 2.784 cm. The material wasted was 6.5, 8.3 and 2.7 kg per bale, respectively, for one lint cleaner, two lint cleaners, and the new cleaner. The new cleaner is available for commercial use.