Know The Working Of Fiber Optic Connectors

By Author: Ryan
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The history of fiber optic telecommunication has taken several generations to get the industry today as a result it deserves a book by itself.


Optical fiber is a long thin cylindrical fiber that is made from glass or plastic, as tiny as one-tenth of a human hair. A standard telecom optical fiber is made up of three cylindrical layers, counted inside out: buffer coating (diameter 900um), fiber core (diameter 8~10um), and cladding (diameter 125um).


Total internal reflection is a phenomenon that is utilized by Optical fibers. From the end face when light is injected into the fiber, it is confined inside the core without leaking outside and losing its energy.


Know about fiber optic connectors and how do they work?


Now you get to know about the optical fibers working. So what is a fiber optic connector and in a fiber optic telecommunication network what's its function?


Keeping it simple, a fiber optic connector's function is just like an electric power plug; from one section of optical fiber to another section of optical fiber it connects light.
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Fiber optic connectors need to be made with high precision since optical fibers are so tiny, at the scale of 0.1um which is one-hundredth of a human hair.


Fiber optic connectors align two fibers end to end so precisely that without bouncing off the interface and losing its signal light can travel from one fiber into another.


For the telecommunication network, the field assembly connector provides cross-connect flexibility. As a result, a complicated computer network could be made modular and easy to manage.


Just like any other connectors used in the computer industry, electric industry, and electronic industry, along with the development of the fiber optic communication industry many different kinds of fiber optic connectors were invented. In the industry, some of them once were very popular and now have served their purposes and are fading away.


In the LC family, the BTW connector is the smallest and designed as a field or board mountable connector using 900um buffered fiber and in some cases, for extraction purposes, it has a slightly extended latch.


To accept the duplexing clip that joins the two connector bodies together the duplex LC connector has a modified body and actuates the two latches as one.


Depending on the vendor the duplex clip has variations. Some duplex clips are a solid one-piece design and it needs to be placed on the cable before connector termination. While other designs have slots built into each side to allow the clip to be installed after connectorization.


So every LC connector is not created equal and depending on style and manufacturer's preference you will find attributes that make one connector more suitable for a specific application than another.


Nowadays the most popular fiber optic connectors used are MTRJ, ST, LC, FC, SC, SMA, and a few other less popular ones. With the progress of this industry, it is sure that you will see new connectors getting invented.

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