Improvement of the Prediction of Yarn Quality Using High Volume Instrument (HVI) Fibrogram

Cotton fiber length along with other fiber quality parameters has been used by the cotton industry to identify the bales for purchase, germplasm evaluation, and mill management. Correction techniques are used across various laboratories to have fiber quality measurements at a similar level across the cotton industry. The High Volume Instrument (HVI) provides the most commonly used fiber length parameters, Upper Half Mean Length (UHML) and Uniformity Index (UI) by following the fibrograph principle. The HVI uses two specific span lengths from the fibrogram curve generated by the HVI system and reports two length parameters, UHML and UI. These two length parameters represent a small part of the fibrogram curve and do not characterize the total within-sample variation in fiber length. In previous studies, we developed a method of characterizing the total within-sample variation in fiber length captured by the whole fibrogram curve and showed that this additional fiber length variation improves the prediction of yarn quality. However, HVIs are currently calibrated for fiber length measurements based on UHML and UI. In this study, we develop a method of correcting the whole fibrogram curve across HVIs using a set of 529 commercial samples. Validation of the correction procedure was also investigated by using an independent set of 932 commercial samples. The results obtained show that it is possible to bring the fibrogram curves measured from multiple instruments into agreement through correction.  This indicates that it could be possible to use the whole fibrogram to improve HVI fiber length measurements across the cotton industry. This would allow cotton breeders and spinners to use the fibrogram measurement of the total within-sample variation in fiber length for germplasm evaluation and mill management.