Telefonaktiebolaget Lm Ericsson (publ)

David Wallin

Wei-Ping Huang

Peter Lindskog

Tomas Adebäck

In splicing two optical fibers to each other using an electric arc formed between electrodes images of the regions being heated and thereby fusioned to each other are taken. The images cover a rectangular field () having the fibers located centrally, along a center line of the field and parallel to the long sides of the field. The images are evaluated to determine a value of the position of the center of the electric arc in relation to the position of the end surfaces of the fibers. This value can then be used for placing the end surfaces just at the arc center. In the image the image of the optical fibers can be excluded so that only light intensity from the air discharge of the electric arc is recorded in the captured images. The field () excluded can be a narrow strip of uniform width located symmetrically around the image of the fibers. Using such a repositioning of the end surfaces of the fibers results in splices which are substantially equal to each other and thus a well repeatable splicing process is obtained.

Method of splicing optical fibers with arc imagining and recentering

The polarization axes of the ends of two PM fibers are aligned in an automatic fiber splicer by first making a linear alignment of the fiber ends () using movable retainers () the same way as for conventional splicing. The fiber ends are rotated by rotatable fixtures () to capture images by a camera () and therefrom, in an image processing and analysis unit (), as controlled by logical circuits () light contrast profiles are determined as functions of the angular position. From the light contrast profiles the polarization axes are determined and then they are aligned with each other. The images are captured of an area at and around the fiber ends as seen in an observation plane. This observation plane is taken to have such a position that the variation of the light contrast profiles is sufficiently large, this making the determination of the angular positions of the polarization axes have a sufficient accuracy, also for for example elliptical core fibers.

Growing community of inventors

Järfälla, Sweden

David Wallin