Fibre Optic Cabling [...]... xv 1 Fiber optic communications and the data cabling revolution Safety statement If you are reading this book then it means you have a practical interest in the use of optical fiber You should be aware of the safety issues concerning the handling of optical fiber and its accessories • • • Always dispose of optical fiber off-cuts in a suitable ‘sharps’ container Never look into the end of fiber optic. .. growth in standardized structured cabling systems has seen optical fiber firmly established as the preferred medium for building backbone and campus cabling applications; indeed it is now the only media that could transport multi-gigabit traffic Fiber optic cabling as an operating system The above section briefly discussed the history of the uptake of optical fiber as a cabling medium in telecommunications,... proposed fiber optic cabling installation as an operating system based upon its bandwidth (or data capacity) Basic fiber parameters Optical fiber transmission is very straightforward There are only two reasons why a particular system might not operate: • • poor design of, or damage to, the transmission equipment; poor design of, or damage to, the interconnecting fiber and components 12 Fiber Optic Cabling. .. of fiber optic systems despite the basic work being broadly successful The fundamental reason for this is that in many cases the fiber optic system was considered to be merely an alternative to an existing copper cabling network, justifiable only on the grounds of secondary issues such as security, weight savings etc In no way were these systems 6 Fiber Optic Cabling utilizing the main features of optical... provided that the light exhibits angles of incidence in excess of the critical angle Optical fiber construction and definitions In the previous section optical fiber was shown to comprise an optical core surrounded by an optical cladding It is normal convention to define a fiber in terms of its optical core diameter and its optical cladding diameter, measured in microns, where 1 micron equals a thousandth... totally 10 Fiber Optic Cabling These three milestones are rapidly being approached; the first two by the application of fiber to the telecommunications subscriber loop (to the home) whilst the third is more frequently encountered due to vastly increased needs for services Meanwhile the economics of fiber optic cabling dictate that while ‘break-even’ distances have decreased the widespread use of fiber- to-thedesk’... exchanges For motorway surveillance the use of optical fiber is mandatory in many areas At the data communications level all the major computer suppliers have some fiber optic product offering within their cabling systems Increasingly process control systems suppliers are able to offer optical solutions within large projects But in most, if not all, cases the fiber optic medium is not a total solution but... non-telecommunications sector, so the solutions for cabling 8 Fiber Optic Cabling have become more linked to those adopted for telecommunications This is quite simply because organizations are viewing even small communications networks as comprising transmission equipment and, but separate from, the cabling medium itself The cabling medium, be it copper or optical, is now frequently seen as a separate capital... communications and the data cabling revolution 9 short-haul, local-loop subscriber connection In this way the convergence between computing and telecommunications is heavily underlined The economics of fiber optic cabling Since its first proposal in 1966 the economics behind optical fiber technology have changed radically The major components within the communications system comprise the fiber (and the resulting... insatiable demand for optical fiber and components such as wavelength division multiplexers This book, however, focuses upon the use of optical fiber in data communications, local area networks and premises cabling This is an area traditionally seen as ‘lower-tech’ where lower-performance multimode fiber was the order of the day This was mostly true up until about 1997 Before that, multimode fiber with an . and its role 2 Fiber optics and the cabling market 3 Fiber optic cabling as an operating system 7 The economics of fiber optic cabling 9 2 Optical fiber theory 2 Basic fiber parameters 2. cables Basic cabling elements Cabling requirements and designs 134 Fiber optic cable design definitions 135 Inter-building (external) cables 138 Intra-building (internal) cables 141 Fiber. manufacture 55 Stepped index fiber preforms 55 All-silica fiber preforms 56 Fiber manufacture from preforms 63 Fiber compatibility 66 Clad silica fibers 66 Plastic optical fiber 67 Radiation