Effects of Fiber Pushback in Ceramic-Ferrule Connectors on Connector Intermateability

摘要

Fiber-optic connectors used in modern communications systems must maintain physical contactrnbetween the fiber cores in mated connector plugs to achieve acceptable reflectance performance.rnStudies have demonstrated that the position of the fiber in the ferrule changes over time in matedrnconnectors. The objective of our study was to first determine and then set limits on the parametersrncritical to minimizing fiber movement and ensuring that physical contact is maintained. We studiedrnthe effects of the ferrule endface radius, the protrusion/recession of the fibers, and the epoxy glassrntransition temperature (T ). We measured fiber movement within a ferrule and did boundaryrnelement analyses of the ferrule endfaces under loading for a number of different cases. Wernconcluded that fiber protrusion/recession is more important than the radius of curvature inrndetermining fiber displacement due to epoxy creep. Even with a well-controlled endface geometry,rnproper specification of the epoxy Tg is still necessary.