journal of kerbala university

This work was conducted to study the effect of factors influencing the extraction process of oil - bearing flakes of sunflower, cotton , and soybean seeds by using the commercial hexane as solvent .
These factors were the moisture content , flake thickness , extraction time , tem- perature of extraction , solvent to seed ratios , and foreign matter for sunflower , cotton , and soybean seeds . The lint and the smut were studied also for the cotton seeds only .
It was found that the moisture content of 9 – 11 % temperature of extraction of 60–65 ºC , flake thickness of 2 – 3 mm , five hours extraction time , and 1 to 1 seed to solvent weight ratio could be recommended as the as the best conditions for the extraction process . Cotton seed lint and smut shouhd be low as much as possible .