Removal of Plastic Materials Using Adjustments and Revisions to Standard Seed Cotton Cleaning Equipment: Progress Report

Plastic material including disposable shopping bags, agricultural mulch, rope, fabric, and module covers is found throughout the cotton growing regions of the world.  US produced lint is known to be relatively contaminant free, but some of these materials inevitably get mixed with the seed cotton and thus also into the baled lint.  Past studies by the authors have shown that cotton gin cleaning equipment removes significant proportions of this contaminant material but also is poor at removing certain categories of this material.  In the studies described in this presentation progress in improving the cleaning effectiveness of seed cotton cleaning equipment at removing plastic materials will be described.