Maintaining Fiber Network With Fiber Optic Identifier

During fiber optic network installation, maintenance or restoration, it is also often necessary to identify a specific fiber without disrupting live service. This battery powered instrument looks like a long handheld bar is called fiber optic identifier or live fiber identifier.

 

Optical fiber identifier employs safe and reliable macro bending technology to avoid disruption of network communications that would normally be caused by disconnecting or cutting a fiber optic cable for identification and testing. The fiber optic identifier is intended for engineers and technicians to identify dark or live fiber and excessive losses due to the misalignment of mechanical splices or poor connections.

 

There is a slot on the top of fiber identifier. The fiber under test is inserted into the slot, then the fiber identifier performs a macro-bend on the fiber. The macro-bend makes some light leak out from the fiber and the optical sensor detects it. The detector can detect both the presence of light and the direction of light.

 

A fiber optic identifier can detect “no signal”, “tone” or “traffic” and it also indicates the traffic direction. The optical signal loss induced by this technique is so small, usually at 1dB level, that it doesn’t cause any trouble on the live traffic. Fiber optic identifiers can detect 250um bare fibers, 900um tight buffered fibers, 2.0mm fiber cables, 3.0mm fiber cables, bare fiber ribbons and jacketed fiber ribbons.

 

Most fiber identifiers need to change a head adapter in order to support all these kinds of fibers and cables. While some other models are cleverly designed and they don’t need to change the head adapter at all. Some models only support single mode fibers and others can support both single mode and multimode fibers.

 

Difference Between Fiber Identifier and Visual Fault Locator

Fiber optical identifier and fiber optic visual fault locator all are most important tools for testing in our network. But sometimes we would mistake them. To be honest, they are different test tools.

 

1. Fiber Optical Identifier, it is a very sensitive photodetectors. When you will be a fiber bending, some light rays from the fiber core. The light will be detected by the fiber identification, technical staff according to these light can be a single fiber in the multi-core optical fiber or patch panel identified from the other fiber out. Optical Fiber Identifier can detect the status and direction of the light does not affect the transmission. In order to make this work easier, usually at the sending end to the test signal modulated into 270Hz, 1000Hz or 2000Hz and being injected into a specific fiber. Most of the optical fiber identifier for the operating wavelength of 1310nm or 1550nm single-mode fiber optical fiber, optical fiber identifier can use the macro folding technology to name the direction and power of the transmission fiber and the fiber under test online.

 

fiber optic identifier from Sunmafiber

 

2. VFL (Visual Fault Locator)

This revolutionary product is based on laser diode visible light (red light) source, when the light being injected into the fiber, if fiber fracture, connector failure, folding over, poor weld quality failure by launching the light of the fiber to fiber fault visual images positioning. Visual Fault Locator launched a continuing trend (CW) or pulsed mode. The common frequency of 1Hz or 2Hz, but can also work in the kHz range. Usually the output power of 0dBm (1mW) or less, the working distance of 2 to 5km, and to support all the common connector.

 

You can get fiber optic identifiers from Wilcom, Ideal, 3M, Sunmafiber and other network test equipment manufacturer. We recommend you Wilcom and Sunmafiber products since both manufacturers have very high customer satisfaction rate.