Cutting Technology of Fiber End of Fiber Array

1. The fiber end of the fiber array

It is often important to carefully fabricate the fiber array so that the fiber ends are well aligned in all dimensions. In addition, the input end or the output end often needs to be encapsulated so that the entire fiber array can be handled conveniently and safely.

For example, the end of the fiber array may be a piece of optical glass material with a suitable shape, which may have features to help alignment, similar to a fiber connector. Especially for 2D fiber array, metal flanges can also be used around them.

You can use bare fiber ends, or apply anti-reflective coatings, which greatly reduces parasitic reflections and coupling loss.

2. Cutting and splicing of fiber array

For mass manufacturing, it is not advisable to cut each fiber individually. Therefore, a laser-based cutting process that can be applied to the entire fiber array has been developed.

Fiber ends are usually cut vertically, but in some cases, they need to be polished at an angle relative to the fiber axis. Usually, people do not polish fibers individually but polish them all after they are firmly embedded in certain glass structures.

Not only can the fusion splicing be applied to a single fiber, but also to the entire fiber array unit. Such processes have been developed, such as the use of CO2 lasers to soften fiber ends. The resulting splice loss can be very low, at least for multimode fibers.