PHYSICOCHEMICAL EVALUATION AND OIL YIELD ASSESSMENT OF COTTON SEEDS

The study aimed at extracting the oil from cotton seed and determination of the physical and chemical properties of the oil. The method used was soxhlet extraction method. The results obtained showed the following chemical compositions: Moisture content (13.55%), pH (5.01), Ash content (1.5g/100g), Heating value (39.06 MJ/kg), Acid value (10.62mgKOH/g), Iodine value (90.20gI2/100g), Cetane number. (51.6), Density (816.2kg/m3), Specific Gravity (0.915), Saponification value (190.20mgKOH/g), FFA (5.05), Viscosity (72mm2/s) and Carbon content (1.97g/100g). The economic importance of the cottonseed oil include; production of cotton seed meal, improve digestion, oil resistance to oxidation, manufacture of bio-diesel and in paint industry, cooking and salad oil sources and cottonseed meal as organic fertilizers. The physical properties studied were unit mass, unit volume, geometric mean, respectively. Information of these properties could be useful in process machine design. On the other hand, knowledge of the chemical properties is important for biodiesel production.