Coating / Curing the Filament

Customer Needs

The final process of producing communications fiber optics is to coat and UV cure the coating on the fiber. This if often called a buffer coating and is used to protect the reflective cladding of the optical fiber. Each fiber line requires three points of temperature measurement. They are:

• After the first coating chamber
• After the first UV curing process
• After the second UV coating

All Temperatures are maintained at approximately 70°C.

The Ircon CHF – H7202 can measure fibers with diameters up to 125 microns from 10 - 275°C. It is non-contact and not affected by surface texture, color, or diameter. With the linear ouputs available closed loop control is the desired final step towards controlling the coating temperature.

Features/Benefits

Product

• CHF 7202 unique for the fiber optics industry.
  
• Fiber is too narrow to be measured with traditional spot pyrometers.

Application

• Better control of cooling and curing processes.
  
• Better control of coating usage.