JPS613106A - Optical fiber connector - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To couple easily and exactly an optical connector, also to decrease the number of parts, and to make it small in size by coupling a ferrule or a plug housing of the ferrule, and an adaptor to each other by a magnetic force. CONSTITUTION:As for a ferrule 7, a coating layer of the tip part of an optical fiber core wire 1 is peeled off and an optical fiber glass 2 is exposed and molded as one body in a mold resin 9, and a ferromagnetic metallic piece 12 is embedded. An adaptor 8 is tubular and has a sleeve for inserting the ferrule 7 of both sides in its inside, and magnet pieces 15, 15 are embedded in both end parts. When the ferrules 7, 7 are inserted into both sides of the adaptor 8, the metallic piece 12 is attracted by the magnet piece 15. In this way, the ferrules 7, 7 of both sides are coupled and fixed firmly through the adaptor 8.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention (Technical Field) The present invention relates to the structure of a connector for connecting optical fibers (hereinafter referred to as an optical connector).

(Background Art) As a coupling method of optical connectors, a structure as illustrated in FIG. 1 has conventionally been used. In the figure, 3 indicates the inside of the plug housing with a screw/&-1v5 into which the optical fiber is inserted and fixed, and a screw for coupling (not shown).
, and 4 is an adapter housing coupled thereto by screws 6. The optical fiber core 1 is a wire formed by applying a coating layer of synthetic resin or the like to the surface of an optical fiber glass 2 (not shown).

In this method of connecting with screws, the number of parts of the optical connector increases, and the maximum outer diameter of one optical connector also increases by l〇-
In the case of coupling optical connectors such as optical fibers with a large number of fibers, the storage thereof is determined by the size of the optical connector, so it has been necessary to miniaturize the optical connector. In addition, this method has the disadvantage that the distance between the optical connectors to be mounted must be large enough for the operator's finger to be inserted in order to improve the operability of attaching and detaching the optical connectors, and the mounting (attachment) density cannot be improved. Was.

(Disclosure of the Invention) The present invention has been made in order to eliminate the above-mentioned drawbacks.
It is an object of the present invention to provide an economical optical fiber connector in which coupling of optical connectors is simple and reliable, the number of parts is small, miniaturization is possible, and economical.

The present invention provides an optical fiber connector comprising a ferrule for fixedly holding an optical fiber and an adapter for positioning and coupling them to each other, wherein the ferrule or the plug housing of the ferrule and the adapter are coupled to each other by magnetic force. This is an optical fiber connector featuring:

Hereinafter, the present invention will be explained by examples using the drawings.

FIG. 2 is a longitudinal sectional view showing an embodiment of the optical connector of the present invention. In the figure, 7.7 is a ferrule that firmly holds the optical fiber glass 2, and 8 is an adapter that accurately positions and connects these to each other.

In FEL-/L/7, the coating layer at the tip of the optical fiber core 1 is peeled off to expose the optical fiber glass 2, which is integrally molded in a mold resin 9. Reference numeral 11 denotes a collar portion, and a piece of ferromagnetic metal (iron, steel, nickel, etc.) 12 is embedded in the tip thereof.

13 is a rubber boot that protects the optical fiber core 1.

The adapter 8 is tubular and has a sleeve 14 into which the ferrules 7 on both sides are inserted, and magnet pieces 15 at both ends.
, 15 are embedded.

Fell/l is provided on both sides of the adapter 8 configured in this way.
/ 7 When inserting the ferrules 7 and 7, the metal piece 12 is attracted to the magnet piece 15, and the ferrules 7 and 7 on both sides are
are firmly connected and fixed via the adapter 8. In addition, the metal piece 12t-magnet of FEL-/I/7 is used,
The same effect can be obtained by using the magnet piece 15 of the adapter 8 as a ferromagnetic metal, or using both as magnets.

Various shapes other than those shown in FIG. 2 can be used for the structure of the ferrule and adapter and the structure of the ferromagnetic metal part and magnet part provided therein in the present invention, and these will be explained below.

FIGS. 8 to 7 are longitudinal cross-sectional views showing other embodiments of the present invention. In the figure, the same reference numerals as in FIG. 2 indicate the same parts.

FIG. 3 shows an example of only the FEL-/L/17 optical connector, in which a ferromagnetic tubular metal case 18 is placed over the outer periphery of the collar 16 instead of the metal piece 12 shown in FIG. It is something. The metal case 18 is divided into two parts and connected by screws 19. The adapter facing this may be the same as that shown in FIG.

Furthermore, if a metal ferrule that is attracted by a magnet is used instead of the above-mentioned plastic ferrule, there is no need to embed or attach a special metal.

The one shown in FIG. 4 also shows an example of the ferrule 27 of the optical connector, and the boxwood part is made of a ferromagnetic metal pipe 20 with a flange. Instead of (Fig. 2), a rubber boom 21 is provided by caulking the rear end of the metal pipe 20. In this case, the metal pipe 20 is coupled to the magnetic piece of the adapter.

FIG. 5 shows an example of the ferrule 37 of the connector for the optical fiber cord 1'.

In the figure, the molded resin 2a of the collar portion 22 includes a Ki-containing vinyl member 24 and a tension member such as Kepler (trade name, manufactured by DuPont, USA) 25, which are also molded together in one mold. In this case as well, a ferromagnetic metal piece 26 is buried in the collar portion 22 as in the case of FIG.

The one shown in Figure 6 is one of the optical connectors.
An example of l/30 is shown. The boxwood portion is surrounded by a ferromagnetic metal plug housing 28, and by pressing this collar 29 with a compression spring 31 housed within the plug housing 28, the wire is constantly pressurized in the distal direction. . The metal plug housing 28 is coupled by a screw 32, which is attracted to and coupled to the magnet piece 15 (FIG. 2) of the adapter 8. In this case, since the FEL/L'30 is always pressurized in the direction of the tip, the tips of the optical fibers 2 on both sides are tightly connected to each other even when the lengths of the parts are uneven when connecting the optical connectors. It has the effect of stabilizing the In other words, even if the ferrule polishing length or adapter length varies, the plug housing
8 is magnetically coupled with the magnet piece 15 (Fig. 2) of the adapter 8, such variations in the material can be absorbed by the moving distance of the ferrule 30 by X (Fig. 7), making the connection stable. Making it a thing 75: It can be done.

Further, the bonding force between the magnet and the metal fitting part or the plug housing part is determined by the size and magnetic properties of the magnet.

In FIG. 2, the same type of ferrules are used on both sides, but as illustrated in FIG. 7, it is also possible to use different types of ferrules on the left and right sides. In the figure, the ferrules inserted on both sides of the adapter 8 are the ferrule type ferrule/L/7 as shown in Fig. 2 on the left, and the plug housing cleave as shown in Fig. 61 on the right. There is a ferrule. In this case, the left side is the metal piece 12 and the cap screw throat piece 15, and the right side is the metal plug housing piece 2.
8 and the magnet piece 15 respectively, but there is no problem even if the left and right suction methods are changed in this way.

Although FIGS. 2 to 7 all show cases in which a ferromagnetic metal part is provided on the ferrule side and a magnet part is provided on the adder free side, the present invention may also use a reverse combination of these.

(Example) As one ferrule, a ferrule as shown in FIG.
L'27・ was created. In the figure, the same reference numerals as in the fourth section indicate the same parts. In FIG. 8, a metal pipe 34 is placed over the outer periphery of the ferrule and molded integrally with mold resin 35 inside.

A ferromagnetic metal pipe 20 with a flange is caulked and fixed to its outer periphery.

The outer diameter of the plug part was 2499 mm and the length was 8 mm, and the outer diameter of the metal pipe 20 with a flange was 8 fl and the length was 10 mm.

As an adapter, an adapter 8 similar to that shown in FIG. 2 as shown in FIG. 9 was prepared. The adapter 8 has an outer diameter of 7 fJ, an inner diameter of g of 51 mm, and a wall of W. 4 rim of rare earth magnet piece 15 embedded length I 6 ram
It belonged to

Also, the other ferrule 30' was created. In the figure, the same reference numerals as in FIG. 6 indicate the same parts. The difference between FIG. 1θ and FIG. 6 is that a metal pipe 37 with a boxwood 36 is provided inside the plug housing 28, the collar 36 of which is pressed by a compression spring 31, and a metal nozzle 38 has an outer diameter of z49 inside.
The length to the tip was 8 mm, the outer diameter of the plug housing 28 was 8 mm, and the compression spring 31 was attached to press the boxwood 36 with a force of about 700 y. Incidentally, the outer diameter of a conventional optical connector is 10 yr, and according to the present invention, it can be made smaller.

When we connected two such ferrules and adapters to connect an optical fiber and evaluated the optical coupling loss, the average was 0.48 db (n-50) for a multimode fiber under steady excitation.
The characteristics are comparable to those of conventional optical connectors. Furthermore, in the heat cycle test, -30° to +70°
℃, it was confirmed that the fluctuation loss was also at a value that poses no practical problem.

(Effects of the Invention) The optical connector of the present invention configured as described above has the following effects.

(B) Since the ferrule or the ferrule plug housing and the adapter as described above are connected to each other by magnetic force, there is no need for devices such as screws or tightening operations to connect the ferrule and the adapter, and it is easy to just insert it. Since the connection can be made reliably, the connection operation of the connector is simple, the optical coupling loss is small, and the device can be miniaturized. For example, it can be configured with an outer diameter of 8 mm, compared to the conventional product's outer diameter of 10 mm.

(Example) Since it is only necessary to embed a ferromagnetic metal part and a magnet part in the ferrule and adapter, the number of parts can be reduced and economy can be achieved. For example, if it is configured with a ferrule type as shown in FIG. 2, a plug housing is completely unnecessary, making it possible to significantly reduce the number of parts and make it more economical.

e→For example, if a plug housing with a compression spring as shown in Fig. 6 is used in at least one ferrule part, there will be variations in the length of parts such as ferrule polishing length and adapter length when optical connectors are connected. 1, the tips of the optical fibers on both sides are brought into close contact with each other to stabilize the coupling.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

Figure ff1t is a side view showing an example of a conventional optical fiber connector. FIGS. 2 to 7 are longitudinal cross-sectional views showing embodiments of the present invention, respectively. FIGS. 8 to 10 are longitudinal cross-sectional views showing ferrules or adapters used in embodiments of the present invention, respectively. l... Optical fiber core wire 1 r... Optical fiber cord, 2... Optical fiber galanus, 3.28... Plug housing sink, 4 ・Adapter housing sink, 6, 19.3
2 Screw, 5.7.1? , 27.27', :10,3
0', 47 ・Ferrule, 8...° adapter, 91
23135・Mold resin, II, 16.22 Collar portion, 12.26...Ferromagnetic metal piece, 13.21.4
0... Rubber boots, 14 Sleeve, 15... Magnet piece, 18... Tubular metal case, 20.87...
・Metal pipe with brim, 24... Vinyl chloride debt, etc., 2
5...Tension metsuba, 29.36 Tsuba, 31
...Compression spring, 34.38...Metal pipe. Aoi 1 Figure 2 Figure 4 circle

Claims (2)

[Claims] (1) In an optical fiber connector comprising a ferrule for fixedly holding an optical fiber and an adapter for positioning and coupling them to each other, the ferrule or the plug housing of the ferrule and the adapter are coupled to each other by magnetic force. Features of optical fiber connectors. (2) The optical fiber connector according to claim 1, wherein the ferrule is always pressurized in the distal direction by a compression spring within the plug housing.