Abstract

Mirror-finished end preparation and low-loss splicing of silica fiber arrays by means of a CO₂ laser are demonstrated. Eight-fiber linear arrays of multimode fibers with 60-μm core diam and 150-μm outer diam were laser scribed and fractured, then butted and spliced with 3.0-W laser power output, 1.0-mm beam-spot diam, and 15-μm/sec fiber array driving speed. Average splice losses for 20× splicings (160 splices) in step- and graded-index fibers were 0.12 db and 0.10 dB, respectively. The air bubbles sometimes observed at the splicing point in fusion splices were avoided by preparing fiber ends with a laser-scribing method.

© 1979 Optical Society of America

Two-dimensionally arrayed optical-fiber splicing with a CO₂ laser

Kyoichi Kinoshita and Morio Kobayashi
Appl. Opt. 21(19) 3419-3422 (1982)

Optical fiber end preparation using a CO₂ laser

K. Kinoshita and K. Egashira
Appl. Opt. 17(8) 1210-1212 (1978)

Optical fiber splicing with a low-power CO₂ laser

K. Egashira and M. Kobayashi
Appl. Opt. 16(6) 1636-1638 (1977)

Fusion splices for optical fibers by discharge heating

Iwao Hatakeyama and Haruhiko Tsuchiya
Appl. Opt. 17(12) 1959-1964 (1978)

Arc-fusion splicing of single-mode fibers. 2: A practical splice machine

Yasuyuki Kato, Shigeyuki Seikai, Nori Shibata, Shigeru Tachigami, Yuichi Toda, and Okosu Watanabe
Appl. Opt. 21(11) 1916-1921 (1982)