QUESTION:
Is Laser cleaving suitable for every assembly operation?
ANSWER:
The investment for cleaving systems is still significant and a semi-automated process might look attractive but the financial numbers need to reflect the improvements. An initial comparison between the manual cleaving operation and the laser cleaving operation is often concentrated on the time of cleave. As the operation time of a manual cleave is a matter of seconds, the manual cleave operation itself is in its advantage. Although the capacity of this operation is usually not a process bottleneck it’s evident that a laser cleaver shows its advantage with a low profile cleave when reduced polishing cost on single fibers are taken into account. Generally, volumes above 200.000-300.000 terminations per month (depending on the type of termination) start to show the break-off to consider this type of automation. For the MT cleaving process the volume required to justify is much lower as the installed cost of an MT ferrule is much higher.
ADDITIONAL CONTENT & RESOURCES:
- Category Resource: FOC Cleave Page
- Find More Information in this Blog: Termination process, connectors and cleaving
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