Southwestern Cotton Ginning Research Lab. The role of the cotton gin has changed dramatically in the last 50 years to keep up with technological and production changes in the cotton industry. At one time, the gin's only function was to remove cottonseed from the fiber. Today, gins must not only separate the seed from the fiber, they must also dry and clean the fiber and package it into bales before it reaches the textile mill.
All gins differ in some aspects of the ginning process.
Elsewhere in the Cotton Belt, gins use only saw gins in their operation. From the storage area, conveyor pipes transfer it to the various stages of the ginning process using large volumes of air to make the flow of the cotton easier and faster. Typically, seed cotton is first dried in large driers using heated air to reduce its moisture content. A cylinder cleaner then removes the leaves and other small trash from the seed cotton by shaking it with spiked cylinders, while conveying it across a screen with small openings that sift the trash released from the seed cotton by the impact action of the cylinders. These saws grab the seed cotton and whip it over metal bars to sling off its trash.