FIBER OPTIC PATCH CABLE OF CABLING SYSTEM MANAGEMENT

by www.fiber-mart.com

For cabling, telecommunication rooms and equipment rooms are the convergence of three businesses including data, voice and image, and its importance is self-evident. So making great efforts in their overall design, equipment stereotypes, hardware configuration, maintenance and other aspects of construction. However, the construction side always tends to ignore the largest number of equipment maintenance and installation of security – fiber optic cables and fiber patch cables in the telecommunications rooms and equipment rooms. While ignoring the problem will bring us a lot of trouble to the machine room management therefore I believe that it is necessary to have proper fiber optic patch cord management operations.

 

In general, reasonable patch cables management can be divided into five processes: planning, preparation, wiring, testing and verification.

 

1. Planning

 

For patch cables management, should be prepared the requirements planning including present and future.

 

1.1 Change Requests. A variety of management activities, move, add or change (MAC) all began in the change requests. Change requests must contain all the necessary information about starting the planning procedures.

 

1.2 Search Records. After receiving the request table, searching the coping recording, in order to determine the circuit paths used.

 

1.3 Correct Routing. Before determine the correct length of fiber optic patch cord, we should first find out the best route between the ports. Usually the shortest route is passing from the horizontal and vertical cable. Moreover shall not obstruct or interfere with the other jumpers or connectors in the distribution frame. When select fiber optic patch cables, should avoid excessive laxity, ensure the appearance clean and tidy. Jumper too tight will increase the pulling force of connectors, whereas overwork slack will bring trouble to jumper management, increase the patch panel’s management difficulty.

 

2. Preparation

 

Before the implementation of management, you should do prepare as much as possible, to research the management records. Determine the label information of connection and reconnect port location and the relevant ports.

 

2.1 First check the require patch cable model, and then check the quality of the jumper. To ensure the quality of the jumper is correct, need to check whether the jumper is damaged. In order to check it is damaged or not, of course you can from the appearance of the jumper, if possible, use professional equipment to check.

2.2 Then check the situation of the require connecting portion, in order to avoid physical damage to the connection parts.

2.3 Finally need to clean the jumper joints and the connecting parts.

 

There are two ways available to clean the fiber connectors: contact and non-contact.

 

Contact Cleaning Method:

(1). Wiping paper and anhydrous alcohol, using raw wood pulp with special processing technology, ultra-low dust, pure texture, high performance water absorption, delicate, will not scratch the surface swabbed, with a low dust wipe with no water-alcohol wipe on fiber optic connectors;

(2). Non-woven fabric, does not produce lint, tough, without any chemical impurities, silky soft, does not cause allergic reactions, and not easy to fluff and hair loss, as the ideal choice for cleaning fiber optic connectors or pins on the production or testing, wipe fiber optical connector with no water-alcohol;

(3). Cleaning cotton swabs, specifically designed for ceramic casing internal cleaning or for cleaning the ferrule end face of the flange (or adapter) which is not easy reached;

(4). Professional cleaner, fiber optic connector special cleaner uses special cleaning wiping belt, mounted in a scramble enclosure, no alcohol, each cleaning is very effective and produces a new surface, convenient and practical.

 

Non-Contact Cleaning Method:

 

(1). Ultrasonic cleaning method, it replaces clean liquid into ultrasonic “column” to the connector end surface, and waste recycling and sucked clean in the same small space;

(2). High-pressure blowing method, its principle is at the connector end first coated with cleaning fluid, and then use high-pressure gas blowing at the connector end surface;

 

2.4 Check the fiber optic connector cleanliness

 

After finish cleaning fiber optic connectors, must check the terminated surface. General practice is to use a magnifying glass 100, 200 times or 400 times to check, the figure below shows the fiber end-face in a pure state and a contaminated state.

 

Patch cable management person, no matter using which method mentioned above, for some serious pollution or difficult to clean connectors, needs to use cotton swabs, alcohol and other cleaning fluid to handle.

 

After this series of preparatory work, it means the wiring work of patch cable management is to expand.

 

3. Wiring

 

Patch panel installation, should base on operational procedures to complete various stages of any work. Patch cable construction kinks, glitches, bad pinch and bad contact are likely to significantly reduce the jumper performance. To avoid such problems, you should focus on the following factors:

 

(1). Bending radius

The minimum bending radius jumper allows need to comply with the jumper manufacturer operating specifications.

 

Standard says, the minimum bend radius of unshielded twisted pair (UTP) cable should be at four times as the diameter of fiber optic cable, shielded twisted-pair cable is as eight times as the diameter of fiber optic cable. The minimum bend radius of 2-core or 4-core horizontal cable is greater than 25mm, if the bending radius is smaller than this standard, it may lead to a change in the relative position of the wire, resulting in reduced transmission performance.

 

(2). Jumper tensile and stress

During wiring process, not excessive force, otherwise it may increase the stress on jumpers and connectors, resulting in decreased performance.

 

(3). Bundle

The jumper is not always needed bundling, if bundled strapping manufacturers need to comply with the principle, not tied too tight, otherwise it will cause a twisted pair variant. Do not over-tighten the clamp, the jumper should be able to freely rotate. Please use a dedicated product, consider choosing repeated use products without tools, such as nylon sticking with buckle belt.

 

4. Testing

 

Even after the jumper wiring completed, but may be that if the fiber links or copper links are in full compliance with operating specifications or cabling international and national standards. Then it should be fiber or copper testing, only in accordance with the testing standards, then can determine whether it passes the test standard.

 

5. Verification

 

(1). It is worth spending the time to the final visual inspection of the connection. Ensure that the jumper relaxation not knot, is not a cabinet door clamp.

 

(2). The final step is based on the existing configuration update records, close and have completed the change request related work orders.

 

Now the fiber optic cable is one of the most important components of integrated wiring system, especially good management operation of fiber jumpers in the data center project, is particularly prominent. Believe that as construction management personnel reasonably jumper management operates, will make the entire comprehensive wiring system become advanced, scientific, practical and reliable.

 

With the large number applications of 10G/40G/100G network in data center, on-site installation and management of fiber optic patch cable becomes increasingly important, the jumpers management sometimes affect the overall channel attenuation, good management ensures fiber channel data transmission in the most excellent condition, process-oriented operations such as planning, preparation, wiring, testing and verification have important significance to assurance the quality of the system.