Seed Cotton Moisture Restoration in a Commercial Gin

Ginning seed cotton which is drier than ideal has been shown to result in increased fiber damage measured by an increased percentage of short fiber and reduced fiber length. Previous work has shown that adding moisture to seed cotton (before fiber removal from the seed) will result in improved fiber length properties. Commercially available atomizing nozzles were installed in a commercial cotton gin to apply unheated tap water to seed cotton between the dropper after seed cotton cleaning and above the auger in the conveyer-distributor situated before ginning. The moisture content (mc) of lint samples collected between the gin stand and the first lint cleaner was increased by between 0.2 and 1.1 percentage points with the system. The lint samples which had been ginned at higher mc had higher Advanced Fiber Information System (AFIS) length by weight and upper quartile length with lower short fiber content. The AFIS non-lint content was higher for higher mc lint and the AFIS nep content was lower but the differences were related to the lint mc, not the spray treatment. A small number of High Volume Instrument measurements were obtained for bales with and without moisture restoration from the same module and no statistically significant differences were observed in the measurements of fiber length, strength, leaf, and uniformity. The seed cotton moisture restoration resulted in a small improvement in fiber length for the commercial gin in which it was installed verifying that previous laboratory scale studies are applicable in commercial settings.

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