Sumitomo Electric Industries, Limited

Sumiden Opcom, Ltd.

Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation

Nippon Telegraph Telephone Corporation

Kazuhiko Arimoto

Hiroshi Suganuma

Hiroaki Takimoto

Hiroshi Yokota

Tomoyuki Hattori

Junichi Yoshikawa

Keiji Osaka

Masumi Fukuma

Takeo Komiya

Yasuo Asano

Hidetoshi Takasugi

Eisuke Sasaoka

Tomomi Sano

Nobuo Tomita

Yoshiharu Okawa

Disclosed is an optical connector connecting apparatus. In the apparatus, a plurality of fixed optical connectors are mounted on a fixed member in a lined-up manner. An optical connector containing member having a movable optical connector mounted thereon is supported on a support member through a small-diameter beam. A moving plate mounted on a base supports the support member, and the movable optical connector is moved in X-axis, Y-axis and Z-axis directions so as to be connected to the fixed optical connector. Therefore, a position deviation at the time of the connection is corrected by the flexing of the small-diameter beam so that fine-positioning is unnecessary.

Optical connector apparatus

Optical connector connecting apparatus and optical connector connecting

A clamp for optical fiber couplers manufacturing apparatus comprises a slotted member having a slot into which optical fibers are inserted and having an opening outwardly winder from the slot so that the optical fibers are introduced into the slot, and a pushing member movably disposed adjacent the slot for pushing the optical fibers through the opening into the slot, wherein the slotted member is away from the pushing member when the fibers are not clamped, and the slotted member is fixed at a position where the slotted member clamps the fibers.

Clamp for use in optical fiber coupler manufacturing apparatus

In an optical fiber coupler fabricating process where couplers are successively formed by heating, elongating and cutting a plurality of long optical fibers, light is led into the first end of the fiber, reflected at the second end of the coupler, and the reflected light is monitored by photodetectors. In this manner, an exact splitting ratio can be obtained. Techniques for minimizing measuring errors caused by the inter-reflected-light interference, the inter-Rayleigh-scattering-light interference, and the interference between the reflected light and the Rayleigh scattering light, while exploiting the advantageous feature of the reflection monitor method that the fiber connection work for each fiber coupler fabrication is not required are disclosed.

Reflection monitor optical fiber coupler manufacturing system and method

The present invention provides a fiber coupler manufacturing apparatus comprising a pair of fiber holding portions and a fiber clamp disposed on each of the fiber holding portions for holding at least two optical fibers. A weight and pulley system is arranged wherein a first weight is coupled to each of the fiber holding portions to pull the fiber holding portions away from each other to apply tension to the optical fibers. A heating unit is disposed between the fiber holding portions and proximate to the optical fibers to heat the optical fibers. A second weight is coupled to either the fiber holding portions or the first weight and rests on a movable platform. As the movable platform descends in a vertical direction, the second weight applies additional force to the fiber holding portions and thus applies additional tension to the optical fibers.

Fiber coupler manufacturing apparatus having an automatic breaking test

The first process for producing an optical fiber coupler includes a first step wherein at least one of the optical fibers to be used is stripped of the coating, a second step in which the bare portion of that optical fiber is heated for a predetermined time to diffuse the dopants, a third step wherein the other optical fibers which have not been heat-treated are stripped of their coating, a fourth step in which the bare portions of all the optical fibers are heated as they are brought into intimate contact, thereby forming a unitary portion, and a fifth step wherein the unitary portion is drawn via heating to form the coupling portion of an optical fiber coupler. The second process for producing an optical fiber coupler includes stripping the coating from at least one optical fiber, fixing the fiber so as to impart an axial stress thereto and then heating the bare portion of the stripped optical fiber thereby thinning the diameter of the heated portion, and then proceeding in the same manner as described with respect to the third through fifth steps of the first embodiment of the present invention. The processes according to the present invention enable a wide-band optical fiber coupler to be easily produced without using optical fibers of different structures but using optical fibers of identical structures.

Process for producing an optical fiber coupler

The invention provides an optical-coupler reinforcing member for fixing and reinforcing a fiber-coupler body and a method of performing the reinforcing. The reinforcing member includes heat-shrinkage tubes which are shrunk by heating, and a hollow protection pipe provided in the heat-shrinkage tubes. Cylindrical heat-fusible adhesive members are provided on opposite ends of the protection pipe, and heating is made such that a fusing portion of an optical-fiber coupler body is inserted through the reinforcing member so that the heat-fusible adhesive members and the heat-shrinkage tubes are shrunk by heating to thereby fix and reinforce the optical coupler body.

Optical-coupler reinforcing material and optical-coupler reinforcing

A reinforcing apparatus for an optical-fiber coupler is formed by placing fused optical fibers into a grooved U-shaped base structure. A cover which has a different longitudinal length than the base structure is centered on top of the U-shaped base structure. There exists an exposed groove section of the U-shaped base structure which lies on either side of the cover. An adhesive is inserted into these exposed groove sections so as to fix the reinforcing casing and the optical-fiber coupler to each other.

Reinforcing apparatus for optical-fiber coupler

A method of reinforcing a multiple optical fiber coupling unit is provided including the steps of removing a portion of longitudinal coatings of optical fibers of the multiple optical fiber coupling unit to expose glass portions of said optical fibers; fusing a portion of the exposed glass portions so as to optically couple the optical fibers; extending the fused portion to a predetermined state; fixing non-extended portions of the exposed glass portions on a first reinforcing substrate with a first adhesive; and fixing the first reinforcing substrate on a second reinforcing substrate with a second adhesive. The multiple optical fiber unit coupler made by this method has a transmission characteristic that does not substantially change even with a temperature change and under high humidity.

Method of reinforcing optical fiber coupler

In a method of producing an optical fiber coupler, in which glass portions of a plurality of optical fibers are heated so as to be fusion bonded to each other and then, are heated so as to be stretched, the improvement comprising: a gas burner which acts as a heat source and has a plurality of gas nozzles arranged in an axial direction of the optical fibers so as to be fixed in position during heating of the glass portions.

Method and apparatus for producing optical fiber coupler

The invention provides a method for producing an optical-fiber coupler with a preset branching ratio. The present invention relates to a method in which part of a plurality of optical fibers are made to closely contact with each other so as to form a coupler. The coupler is heated to thereby obtain a predetermined branching ratio; the flow rate of a gas to be supplied to a heat source is increased/decreased by a quantity proportional to a difference between the drawing speed and a preset drawing speed while predetermined tension is applied to the optical fibers.

Growing community of inventors

Tokyo, Japan

Kazuhiko Arimoto