Been splicing for a good while now. Lots of coaxial, and lots of fiber over the years. I have just off the top of my head spliced Perrelli, Hitachi, Superior Essex, Alcatel, Sumitomo, Prysmain, Corning, Valtec, Samsung, OFS, and unfortunately Draka. No serious problems with the others, just the Draka.
I don't know what it is about the stuff, and I've used three different machines to splice the crap with, and always have trouble. The biggest of which is mode field diameter mismatches. Think holding your finger up to you thumb, seriously that much of a contrast when viewing the screen. Looks like your trying to splice SM to MM. Then you end up cleaving back an inch at a time to get cores that will match up. Now keep in mind this is supposed to be single mode fiber, says so right on the jacket, so I'm not mistaking it for multi-mode fiber. No matter how many arc checks are done, just doesn't want to splice. Plenty of visual errors too. Next, and this has only happened a couple times in the last few years that I have been seeing this junk, is the cladding came off when stripping the buffer. Nice to see that when trying to splice the fiber, and all you have is a core. Had that happen with some old Valtec too, just to be fair.
As yet, I don't personally know anyone who has not had problems with Draka. Any other fiber splicers had trouble with this stuff, and is there a workaround? I've tried changing arc temps and such to no avail. I always end up getting the stuff burned together with some re-burns found while testing. It is just that it takes three, four times longer to get it done as compared to any other fiber that I have spliced.
Is Draka some derivative of a Romanian word for Devil, because this stuff is giving me the devil for sure?
I don't know what it is about the stuff, and I've used three different machines to splice the crap with, and always have trouble. The biggest of which is mode field diameter mismatches. Think holding your finger up to you thumb, seriously that much of a contrast when viewing the screen. Looks like your trying to splice SM to MM. Then you end up cleaving back an inch at a time to get cores that will match up. Now keep in mind this is supposed to be single mode fiber, says so right on the jacket, so I'm not mistaking it for multi-mode fiber. No matter how many arc checks are done, just doesn't want to splice. Plenty of visual errors too. Next, and this has only happened a couple times in the last few years that I have been seeing this junk, is the cladding came off when stripping the buffer. Nice to see that when trying to splice the fiber, and all you have is a core. Had that happen with some old Valtec too, just to be fair.
As yet, I don't personally know anyone who has not had problems with Draka. Any other fiber splicers had trouble with this stuff, and is there a workaround? I've tried changing arc temps and such to no avail. I always end up getting the stuff burned together with some re-burns found while testing. It is just that it takes three, four times longer to get it done as compared to any other fiber that I have spliced.
Is Draka some derivative of a Romanian word for Devil, because this stuff is giving me the devil for sure?
