Category: Fiber Transceivers

Cutting and splicing fiber optic cable takes a lot of time, interrupts service to downstream customers and, therefore, needs to be avoided. One way to avoid splicing is to include extra fiber cable in places along the lines, in case the company needs to change out a pole or make a road crossing.

ETC Communications (ETC) in Ellijay, GA is a family owned company that has been in business for over 100 years. ETC uses fiber optic cable to provide telephone, cable TV, and high-speed Internet to about 17,000 customers in northern Georgia and southeastern Tennessee. They typically include 25 to 50 feet of spare cable approximately every fifth span. The question is…

HOW TO STORE THE EXTRA CABLE?

Option 1: Coiling

Extra cable can be coiled and attached to the pole. However, coiling can cause light loss. In a fiber optic cable, information is transmitted by light that travels through the glass fibers in the cable. Some light is lost when the cable is bent, especially when it is cold. “It does get cold here about four or five times a year,” says  Van Powell, Construction Manager for ETC,  “and when I say cold, I mean below 10°F. When it got below 18°F, we used to have excessive light loss in our long cable runs with lots of coils.” In addition to possible attenuation, coils stored on utility poles take up space and can be damaged by linemen climbing the pole.

Option 2: “Snowshoes”

ETC uses “snowshoe” storage systems to store extra fiber on the line. Snowshoes allow for the slack to be stored out in the span, reducing likelihood of damage while eliminating additional charges for using pole space. ETC’s storage systems have a turning diameter of about 20 inches. Two units are installed at an appropriate distance and the cable is stretched between them. This greatly reduces the number of turns–from hundreds to two and solves the problem of light loss.

The Opti-Loop® Storage System Advantage

ETC has been using products from a couple of different vendors, and last fall, they gave the Hubbell Power Systems, Inc. (HPS) Opti-Loop®  storage systems a try. Powell explains, “There are probably 15 or 20 different companies that make similar systems and we’ve used different kinds in the past. Last year, Phil Peppers, ProCom Sales, brought us five sets of the Opti-Loop storage systems to try them. We put them up, and we like them.” While fiber optic snowshoes, in general, solve the problem, the Opti-Loop storage systems have an advantage: they are very easy to install. “There is a twisted aluminum support wire on the poles. That is what holds up the fiber optic cable. We bring in a bucket truck and attach each snowshoe to that cable with a bolt and clamp. The fiber optic cable is attached to the snowshoes with zip ties and along the support wire with lashers (little coils). It only takes about 15 minutes to mount the pair of snowshoes. The prices for the Opti-Loop storage system is competitive and they are easy and fast to install,” concludes Powell.

As fiber optic cable has become more affordable and data rates are growing, many project managers and IT professionals are starting to ask, “When should I use fiber optic cable?”

What type of project is it?

While working on a project its important to decipher whether it’s a new or current renovation of a system already in place. If there is already copper in place, it may make the most sense to just update the copper components. But, depending on the length of the cable being run and the users, it could be more beneficial and cost effective to install fiber optic cable instead. Check out this blog post comparing the advantages of fiber optic cable over traditional copper.

Although it’s important to abide by building code regulations, like the National Electric Code (NEC), its also important to evaluate the space in the which the project is taking place and the people that will be using it. If they’ll be using it long-term and updating often, fiber optics might be the proper investment to use.

Who will the users be? What will they be doing?

Many large structures like university campuses, hotels and casinos are beginning to use fiber optic cables to support their number of employees and guests, number of devices and the amount of data that is being transferred across the facilities network.

With the growing rate of data, cloud services, videos, remote staff, videoconferencing, copper cable systems can only handle so much so quickly. Large facilities are now seeing the growing need for fiber optics to handle the data being transferred.

Have you conducted a building survey?

Important things to consider when looking to install fiber optic cable are:

What will the fiber be used for?

Will it all be inside or does it need to run between buildings?

Is there a lot of foot traffic and potential users?

Is wireless needed?

Do any areas need special attention?

How many connections are needed?

Because fiber can eliminate cross-talk and run greater distances than copper cable, answering these questions when working on a project can allow you to decide if copper or fiber will be needed.

What is Needed for the Future?

The fiber optic cable bandwidth will always be superior to copper cable systems. No matter how many new devices, data, etc, fiber will always be able to hold the proper connection. Understanding the space will be used in the future can show you what type of cable is needed.

Fiber optic cable has the ability to provide any business with safe, fast installations with higher bandwidth frequencies. In order to understand what fiber optic cable can do for your business or home, it’s important to understand the basic construction.

Fiber optic cables are design is consisted of: core, cladding, coating and jacket.Core- this is the very center of the cable and the light is guided down through by light transmission. The core is a single strand of glass that is measured in microns (µm). The larger the core, the more light the cable can carry.

Sizes of the core:

8μm (8.3 or 9μm) Single Mode

50μm – Mulit-mode

62.5μm – Multi-mode

Cladding- this is a thin layer of glass that surrounds the core and serves to contain the light within the core. The cladding has a different index of refraction than the core so the light waves that are re-directed back into the core allow for continuous light transmission within the fiber.

Size of the cladding:

125 µm.

Coating- This surrounds the cladding and acts as a protector for the glass. The coating is normally clear, but for all Outdoor cables the coating is color coded to help identify the individual fibers. This needs to be removed to connect the fiber to the connector or splice.

Size of coating:

250µm

Jacket- the cable jacket works along with the fibers to provide strength, signal integrity and overall protection of the fiber. There a variety of jacket materials that are used in the fiber cable construction. Environmental parameters that need to be considered upon installation are: temperature, chemical reaction, sunlight, mechanical and abrasion resistance.

If you would like to learn more about the benefit to fiber optic cable compared to copper cables, click this link to be transferred to another blog post to view more.

Fiber optic cable can be used for many applications such as: telecommunications, high bandwidth data, video signaling, long distance CCTV, communication between fire alarm panels and much more!

Although wire and cable are referred to as the same thing, they are different with separate characteristics. Both wire and cable are used in the communication and security world, and are designed to carry a message from one point to another. So what are the differences between the two?

Wire:

Wire is a single conductor with one or multiple strands of copper, they are low resistance and cost effective. A wire is the conductor that makes up a component of a cable. They are also measured by their diameter which is commonly referred to as gauge (AWG) size and insulated capacity. They are two types of wires: Solid and Stranded.

Solid wire: Single conductor that can be bare or insulated. This offers low resistance and are best used in higher frequency environments due to the design but are less flexible.

Stranded wire: Composed of numerous wires wrapped together to offer a larger conductor. This offers greater flexibility and higher resistance.

Cable:

A cable is a group of two or more insulated wires all wrapped into one jacket. Unlike wire, cable is designed with a “hot” wire carrying the current, neutral wire and a ground wire. They are classified by the number of wires it composed of and their gauge (AWG) sizes.

Twisted pair cable:

A twisted pair cable is designed with two cables that are twisted together. The twisting helps to eliminate noise which is why it is used to carry signals. Twisted pair cable comes both shielded and unshielded.

Coaxial cable:

A coaxial cable has a single conductor in the center and is surrounded by a braided metal shield. Inside the cable 2 conductors are separated by an insulating dielectric. These cables are harder to install but used for networking devices such as TVs or cameras.

Multi-Conductor cable:

A multi-conductor cable has two or more conductors inside of the jacket, they are insulated from each other, and can come in many variations. They are used to protect signal integrity by reducing noise and cross-talk.

Fiber Optic cable:

A fiber optic cable transmit signals through a bundle of glass threads. Fiber optic cable have a greater bandwidth than traditional copper cable so they are used for areas that receive high amounts of data. Click here to learn the different between copper vs fiber optic cable.