1/7/2021

Fiber Length

Fiber Length
Why fibre length?
Quality assessment 
Quality prediction 
Fibre breakage study 
M/C settings
Combing efficiency etc.

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Fiber Length
Fiber length can be expressed as
Staple length (STPL)
Mean length (ML)
Upper quartile length (UQL) 
Effective length 
Modal length (MoL)
Span length (SL)
Upper half‐mean length (UHML)

Fiber Length
The parameters used to estimate fiber length variations
Dispersion %
Uniformity index (UI) 
Uniformity ratio (UR)
Short fiber content (SFC), and
Floating fiber index (FFI)

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Staple Length
The staple length is defined by USDA as "the normal length of
typical portion of staple fibers having relative humidity of 65%
and temperature of 70°F without regard to value or quality."
Classification of Cotton Fibers according to Their Staple Length
Staple Length
(mm)  Description
< 20.6 Short 
20.6‐25.4 Medium
26.2‐27.8 Medium Long 
28.6‐33.3 Long 
>34.9 Extra Long 

Mean Length
• The mean length of the fibers is defined as "the average
length of all fibers in the test specimen based on weight‐
length data".

• It can also be calculated by number‐length data as an

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Upper Quartile Length
According to ASTM,Upper Quartile Length (UQL) is defined as
"the fiber length which is exceeded by 25% of fibers by weight
in test specimen"
(mm)  Description
< 27.9 Short 
27.9 ‐ 31.5 Medium
31.8 ‐ 35.3 Long 
>35.3 Extra Long 

Effective Length
• The effective length is longer than the average length and is a
measure of the length of the majority of longer fibers in a
sample.
• The effective length is described statistically as the upper quartile
of the fiber length distribution obtained by ignoring short fibers
whose length is less than half of the effective length of fibers.

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Modal Length
• The modal length is the length of the high frequency fiber in the
sample obtained from the fiber length frequency diagram.
• The modal length of long staple cotton is higher than the mean
staple length due to the progressive increase in skewness with
increasing staple length in the fiber length distribution

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Span Length
• The 2.5 % span length is defined as the length of fiber at
which only 2.5% of long fibers are excluded.
• It provides the reference length for roller settings to be
adjusted so that few, if any, fibers are broken.
• The 2.5% span length is close to upper half‐mean length
(UHML) for long staple cotton.
• The 50% span length is more valuable as a potential measure
of yarn quality and spinning performance.

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For Flatter middle zone dispersion is minimum

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Uniformity Ratio
• The uniformity ratio (UR%) is the ratio of the 50% span length to the
2.5% span length.
Uniformity ratio (U.R.) = 50 % span length /2.5 % span length
= S50% / S2.5%
Uniformity ratio (U.R.) in %=  (50% span length /2.5 % span length ] ×100
= (S50% / S2.5%)×100
• It is a smaller value than the uniformity index by a factor about 1.8
Uniformity Ratio Description
>48 Very high
47‐48 High
44‐45 Average
41‐43 Low
<11 Very Low 

 It can also be measured in percentage by number of

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II. This is laid on flat black background and the

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