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Fiber Optics

LIGHT CRIMP TERMINATIONS USING THE PRENTIUM KIT

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Fiber Optics

Terminating fiber has always been considered the most difficult part of installing a fiber optic cable plant.

First you have to deal with hair thin strands of glass, then you have to glue a connector on the end of the fiber and crimp it to the cable.

Then, you polish the ends with multiple grades of fine sand paper and historically this was done with water.

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Fiber Optics

Because of this copper wiring has always claimed a big advantage over fiber, although terminating Cat 6 is not easy either.

Numerous methods for epoxy/polish connectors have been developed in attempts to simplify fiber optic termination and speed up the process.

You’ve already terminated fiber using this method which has been refined somewhat.

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Fiber Optics

Pre-polished crimp connectors eliminate the need for adhesives and polishing in the termination process.

Instead they use a factory terminated connector with a stub fiber in the ferrule and a mechanical splice to terminate the fiber.

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Fiber Optics

Termination only requires preparing the cable, cleaving the fiber, inserting it in the connector and setting it with a special tool.

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Fiber Optics

Fiber optic connector manufacturers make pre-polished/splice connectors by gluing a short stub fiber into the connector ferrule and polishing it perfectly with machines in the factory.

The back of the connector is modified with the addition of a mechanical splice, complete with index-matching gel to reduce loss at the fiber interface and a crimp to hold the fiber.

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Fiber Optics

The key to producing a low loss connector of this type is the cleave process.

The better the cleave the lower the loss will be.

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Fiber Optics

The Uni-cam light crimp kit has been one of the most popular and commonly used methods to field terminate fiber.

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Fiber Optics

Uni-Cam uses pre-polished connectors with index matching gel in the connector.

It utilizes a fairly simple cleave tool to cut the fiber and the fiber is then inserted into the connector.

The cam tool is used to set the fiber optic strand in the connector and crimp it in place.

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Fiber Optics

Here is the Uni-cam cleave tool and the cam tool

OLD VERSION OF THE CLEAVE TOOL

NEW VERSION OF THE CLEAVE TOOL

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Fiber Optics

The Uni-cam kit has evolved into the Pretium termination kit.

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Fiber Optics

The advantages of the light crimp method is that it takes less time to terminate fiber, an installer can usually terminate a strand in 1 to 1.5 minutes.

There is no need for an expensive consumables kit either and it doesn’t require a large work surface.

The kit is small an easily transportable and self contained.

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Fiber Optics

One of the disadvantages, however is that the reliability over the long haul is questionable.

Without an epoxy or adhesive to retain the fiber, there is less chance of being able to resist the effects of exposure to environmental extremes.

Such effects as "pistoning" (movement of the fiber within the ferrule as a result of varying temperature/humidity) are apt to occur.

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Fiber Optics

Another disadvantage of this system is that the connectors are much more expensive because of their complexity, generally around $13.00 dollars a piece compared to $5.00 dollars for an epoxy/polish connector.

And they have a trash rate, it is expected that about 10 to 20% of the connectors will not be terminated successfully, very dependent on the installer.

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Fiber Optics

The crimp mechanism is not capable of retaining and aligning singlemode fibers well enough to provide adequate optical performance so this type is only available for multimode cable.

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Fiber Optics

One of the disadvantages of the Uni-cam method, the trash rate has been addressed with the Pretium kit.

The Pretium kit has a built in VFL that test the fiber connector before you install it in the patch panel so you will know right away if you made a good connector. A GREEN LIGHT IS

GOOD, A RED LIGHT MEANS A BAD CONNECTOR.

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Fiber Optics

Using the Pretium kit the first thing you will do is prep the tool, make sure the correct ferrule adapter is in the tool (SC, ST or LC)

Press the reset button and slide the cradle back to it’s stop position.

The load button should be released.

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Turn the power switch on.

Insert a connector, make sure it is properly placed into the tool.

MAKE SURE THE WRITING IS FACING UP WHEN IN THE TOOL, LCs WILL HAVE THE LATCH FACING UP.

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Fiber Optics

• Here are the different pieces of each connector, the copper crimp sleeve and larger boot is used for break out cable only.

THE BLACK FERRULE PROTECTOR WILL HAVE TO BE REMOVED BEFORE PLACING IT IN THE TOOL.

ST UNI-CAM CONN.

SC UNI-CAM CONN.

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Fiber Optics

Remove the dust caps before placing the connector in the tool, depress the load button and load the connector into the tool.

Once the connector is firmly seated, the end that the fiber goes into should protrude out a little, release the load button.

Close the cover, the error light should stay off.

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Fiber Optics

Prep the fiber for termination;

Slide the boot over the fiber.

Measure 40mm and mark the strand with a sharpie.

MAKE A MARK 40MM OR 1.5 INCHES FROM THE END OF THE STRAND

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Strip this 40mm of jacketing off of the strand, it is best to strip about ½ an inch at a time if you try to strip the whole 40mm or 1.5” off at one time you will probably break the fiber.

40 MM OF BARE FIBER

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Fiber Optics

Make another mark on the jacketing 11mm back if using ST and SC connectors, LC will be 9mm back.

Clean the bare fiber with alcohol being careful not to touch the bare fiber with your fingers.

11 mm

40 mm

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Its time to cleave the fiber:Squeeze buttons A and B at the same time to openthe clamps and place the fiber in the slot so the:

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Fully release Button B, then release Button A, ensure that both the bare and coated fiber is secured by the clamps.

Slowly turn the knob 360 degrees to cleave the fiber. Squeeze Button A, remove the scrap fiber, and place it in the scrap fiber bin.

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While holding onto the fiber, squeeze Button B and remove the cleaved fiber.

NOTE: Once the fiber is cleaved, do not clean the fiber or allow it to contact anything. If the cleaved fiber does contact something, repeat fiber preparation and re-cleave.

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Insert a cleaved fiber into the back of the lead-in tube. Insert the fiber until you feel it firmly stop against the fiber stub. The visual mark on the fiber should be within 2 mm of the lead-in tube.

While maintaining enough inward pressure to create a slight bend in the fiber, squeeze the CAM button in until it locks.

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Insert fiber until it stops, do not push to hard, 2mm of jacketing will be exposed from the mark you made, press the cam button

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If you get a green light the termination was successful, if it turns red it is a re-do you just trashed a fiber connector.

Remember the trash rate we talked about.

Reverse the process to remove the connector from the tool.

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The instruction manual for terminating fiber using the Pretium kit is include as a hand out in today’s lesson.

You can use it as reference while you practice terminating your fiber connector.