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Technical article
September 2016 72
[4] IEC 60794-1-22 Ed 1.0: Optical Fibre Cables-Part
1-22: Generic specification- Basic optical cable test
procedures- Environmental test methods.
[5] IEC 60332-1-2 Edition 1.0: Test on electric and
optical fibre cables under fire conditions- Part
1-2: Test for vertical flame propagation for a
single insulated wire or cable- Procedure for 1kW
pre-mixed flame.
Paper courtesy of the 64th IWCS Technical
Symposium, Atlanta, Georgia, USA,
November 2015.
The breakage appeared as the force
increased to 2,300N, and this value far
exceeded the users’ requirements.
4.2.2.2 Crush test
In this test, the specified crush force was
500N, and the time for imposed pressure
was 1 min.
The result obtained for the 500N load is
shown in Figure 4, where there was almost
no change for the attenuation during the
test, even at the high load. The additional
attenuation was reversible and there was
no damage to the cable outer sheath.
4.2.3 Environmental property
Water penetration and temperature
cycling test according to IEC 60794-1-22
F5and IEC 60794-1-22 F1, respectively,
were carried out and the results are shown
in the following section.
4.2.3.1 Water penetration test
The water penetration test was carried out
on a 3m flat cable sample; the cable must
sustain 1m height of water for 24 hours.
After this there should be no water
penetration. Five samples were cut to
verify the water penetration performance
of the cable, and all of the five samples
passed the test.
4.2.3.2 Temperature cycling test
According to the requirements of the
clients, the flat cable went through a
temperature cycling test from – 20ºC to
+60ºC, and kept 12 hours for -20ºC and
+60ºC, respectively.
The whole temperature cycling test
included two cycling process. When the
experiment was over, the additional
attenuation of the flat cable was tested,
and the results showed that it was much
less than 0.1dB which was the acceptance
criteria of the client.
4.2.4 Flame retardant test
The flat cable designed was mainly used
for the drop application, and the sub-unit
of the cable should satisfy flame retardant
requirements.
A vertical flame propagation for a single
sample according to IEC 60332-1-2
standard was carried out. After the flame
application reached 60 seconds, the
distance between the lower edge of the
top support and the onset of charring was
120mm.
In other words, the riser cable
demonstrated in this paper is safe for the
drop application.
5 Conclusions
The first and second designs of the flat
cable could both satisfy good processing
performance, and the test results showed
that they also both have excellent
transmission, mechanical, environmental
and flame retardant properties.
These two kinds of flat cable could
apply in the FTTH application and give
the operator more choice for the drop
application. n
6 Acknowledgments
The authors wish to thank the staff of Fiber
Home Telecommunication Technologies
Co Ltd for their support. Special thanks to
the IWCS staff for the articles in this year’s
publication.
7 References
[1] Qingqing Qi, Kai Fu “A new all-dielectric aerial
cable for FTTH access network,” Proceedings of
63rd IWCS (2014).
[2] Enrico Consonni, Paolo Marelli, “Latest
developments on high fibre count cables for
metro/access networks dedicated to FTTH
applications”, Proceedings of the 57 th IWCS (2008).
[3] Mechanical performance for cables: IEC 60794-1-2
Ed 2.0: Optical Fibre Cables- Part 1-2: Generic
specification- Basic optical cable test procedures.
CRUSH3
Qin Yu, Fei Qian, Liming Chen, Qingqing
Qi, Shiying Wang, Huiping Shi, Cheng Liu
FiberHome Telecommunication
Technologies Co Ltd
Wuhan, Hubei, China
Tel: +86 27 87420569
Email:
▲ ▲ Figure 3: The tensile limit test of the cable
▲
▲ Figure 4: Crush performance for the cable