Saw type lint cleaners are efficient cleaners, but their aggressive nature also causes more fiber damage and wastage. As the U. S. cotton market shifts to overseas, where customers are interested in longer fiber with fewer neps and fiber damage, there was a renewed interest to re-evaluate the performance of a pinned cylinder lint cleaner, a study first initiated by Columbus (1989). A pinned cylinder, because of its round body pins was expected to cause less damage to the fiber and create less neps in the process. A total of 48 runs with 3 replicates were conducted for the experiments. The bi-level treatment factors included cylinder treatments ( pin or saw cylinder), cylinder speed, combing ratio, and variety.

Results from this study show that HVI properties produced by the pin and saw cylinder cleaners were very similar in reflectance and yellowness. The pin cylinder lint cleaner produced lower turnouts (6.6 lbs/bale) and generated more cleaner wastes (4.0 lbs/bale of STV4892) at higher cleaning efficiency (11.1% difference). Comparing to the saw cylinder lint cleaner, the smooth body of the pins on the cylinder did not bring any advantages in neps and short fiber content. In fact, bales produced by the pin cylinder lint cleaner contained more short fiber (3.3 lbs/bale) and neps (44 neps/g).