How Do Fiber Optic Connectors work? The history of fiber optic telecommunication deserves an entire book on its own because it took several generations to reach the state of the art today.

Optical fiber is a long thin cylindrical fiber that is made of plastic or glass, smaller than one tenth of a human hair. A standard telecom optical fiber comprises three layers of cylindrical shape, arranged from the inside out as fiber core (diameter 8x10um), the cladding (diameter of 125um) along with buffer coating (diameter 9000um).

Fiber core and cladding is made from glass or silica. The fiber core and the cladding layers combine to contain the light within the core, without leaking. The fiber buffer coating is constructed of plastic or acrylic and provides handling flexibility and physical protection to the fiber.

Optical fibers utilize an optical phenomenon known as total internal reflection. When light is injected into the fiber from the end, it becomes contained within the core, not leaking out and wasting its energy.

Then light is digitally modulated to show the numbers 1 and 0 like a computer, and information can be transferred from one site to another, which could be from San Francisco all the way to New York.

What are fiber optic connectors ? And how do they work?

Now you know how optical fibers work. What is a fiber optic connector and what is its purpose in the fiber optic telecommunications network?

In simple terms, a fiber optic connector’s job is similar to that of an electric power source that relies on light to transmit from one segment of optical fiber to a different section of optical fiber.

Since optical fibers are so tiny that fiber optic connectors need to be made with high precision, with a scale that is 0.1um that is just one centimeter of a human hair.

Fiber optic connectors align two fibers end to end in a way that light can be transferred from one fiber to another without bounce off the connector and losing its signal.

Besides the fact that fiber optic connectors offer cross connect flexibility for the telecommunication network. Thus, a complex computer network can be modularized and manageable.

Like other connectors used in electronic industry, electric industry and computer industry, 비회원 구매 many different kinds connected to fiber optic cables were developed during the evolution of the fiber optic communications. Certain types were once extremely popular in the field but they have since been used for a variety of purposes, but are now fading away.

The most widely used fiber optic connectors used nowadays are SC, ST, LC, FC, MTRJ, SMA and a few of lesser-known ones. You will surely see new connectors being developed as a result of the progress of this industry.