The basic concepts behind the new short fiber and elongation measurements on the High Volume Instruments from Zellweger Uster,Inc. are reviewed. Several tests of these algorithms have been made during the last year including two large scale tests by USDA of the short fiber measurement. The USDA Candidate Calibration Bale tests gave an average CV% of 7.3% for the short fiber measurement for all HVIs. When only one HVI is used, the CV% decreased to 6.0%. This is attributed to setup differences between HVIs. The Check Lot test by USDA allowed estimation of sustainment results for short fiber measurements. For a tolerance of 1%, the actual sustainment is 79.1%. The sustainment value estimated from the standard deviation is 75.5%. Improvements in setup procedures increase this to only 78.3%. The conclusion is that the differences in the short fiber reading is much more dependent on the selection of the cotton sample than on the sample preparation and setup of the HVI.