A novel method using phase inversion technique, to spin hollow fiber membrane was proposed in this work. Using polyacrylonitrile, the hollow fibers are spun. The characterization of the hollow fibers indicated that they are in the range of microfiltration membranes. Turbid water with high turbidity (from 200 to 1000 NTU) was treated using various cross flow velocities and transmembrane pressure drop values. Effects of these operating conditions on the permeate flux were studied in detail. Two modes of operating conditions were studied, namely, total recycle mode and batch mode. In all the cases, the turbidity of the permeate was found to be zero. A simple resistance in series model was used to quantify the cake resistance and its dependence on the operating conditions. (C) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.