JP2018132541A - Optical fiber cable - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an optical fiber cable capable of taking out an optical fiber core wire from an optical fiber cable without damaging the optical fiber core wire. SOLUTION: An optical unit 10 in which a plurality of optical fiber core wires are collected, two tension members 12 arranged on both sides of the optical unit, and a cable outer cover 11 provided around the optical unit. It is an optical fiber cable 1 provided with. The optical unit is spirally wound and bundled in one direction with one or more bundle materials 20, or the optical unit is spirally wound while intersecting the two bundle materials. The optical units are bundled or the two bundled materials are spirally wound while intersecting with each other, and are bonded and bundled at the intersecting positions. [Selection diagram] Fig. 1

Description

  The present invention relates to an optical fiber cable in which a plurality of optical fiber cores are covered with a cable jacket, and more particularly to a wiring cable that branches an optical fiber core in the middle of the cable and performs intermediate pulling.

  In addition to increasing the communication speed and the amount of information due to the spread of information communication such as the Internet, the construction of optical networks is progressing to support bidirectional communication and large-capacity communication. In this optical network, FTTH (Fiber To The Home), which provides a high-speed communication service by directly connecting a communication carrier and each home with an optical fiber, has been started. With the expansion of the optical fiber into the subscriber's house and the expansion of the local network, the optical fiber is branched from the middle part of the optical fiber cable containing a plurality of optical fibers (referred to as an optical fiber intermediate branch). However, there is an increasing demand for wiring work distributed to multiple homes and multiple terminals.

  Here, if the optical fiber core is buried in the extruded cable jacket, it is difficult to take out the optical fiber core at the time of intermediate branching of the optical fiber. Therefore, for example, in Patent Documents 1 and 2, an inclusion (or an interposition tape) is disposed between the optical fiber core and the cable jacket, and the inclusion (or interposition tape) is brought into contact with the optical fiber core. An optical fiber cable structure is disclosed. Patent Document 3 discloses a structure of an optical fiber cable in which a tension member is in contact with an optical fiber core wire.

Japanese Patent No. 4297372 JP 2009-217195 A JP 2012-137590 A

  However, in the structures of Patent Documents 1 to 3, since there is an optical fiber core wire that is still in contact with the cable jacket, this optical fiber core wire may still be difficult to take out at the time of intermediate branching of the optical fiber cable. . Further, when the optical fiber core wire is pulled out from the cable jacket and taken out, it is desired that the optical fiber core wire is not damaged.

  The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and an object of the present invention is to provide an optical fiber cable that can take out the optical fiber core wire from the optical fiber cable without damaging the optical fiber core wire. To do.

  An optical fiber cable according to an aspect of the present invention includes an optical unit in which a plurality of optical fiber cores are gathered, two tension members disposed on both sides of the optical unit, and a periphery of the optical unit. An optical fiber cable including a cable jacket provided, wherein the optical unit is wound in one direction spirally with one or a plurality of bundle members and bundled, or the optical unit Are bundled by being wound spirally while two bundle members intersect, or at the position where the optical unit is wound spirally while intersecting two bundle members Glued and bundled.

  According to the above, the optical fiber core wire can be taken out from the optical fiber cable without damaging the optical fiber core wire.

It is a figure which shows an example of the optical fiber cable by 1st Embodiment of this invention. It is a figure which shows an example of the optical unit which collected the optical fiber core wire. It is explanatory drawing when taking out an optical unit from the optical fiber cable of 1st Embodiment. It is a figure which shows the other example of the optical unit which collected the optical fiber core wire. It is a figure which shows the further another example of the optical unit which collected the optical fiber core wire. It is a figure which shows an example of the optical fiber cable by 2nd Embodiment of this invention. It is a figure which shows an example of the optical fiber cable by 3rd Embodiment of this invention. It is a figure which shows an example of the optical fiber cable by 4th Embodiment of this invention.

[Description of Embodiment of the Present Invention]
First, the contents of the embodiment of the present invention will be listed and described.
An optical fiber cable according to an aspect of the present invention includes: (1) an optical unit in which a plurality of optical fiber cores are collected; two tension members disposed on both sides of the optical unit; and the optical unit An optical fiber cable including a cable jacket provided around the optical unit, wherein the optical unit is spirally wound in one direction with one or a plurality of bundle members and bundled, or The optical unit is spirally wound and bundled while two bundle members intersect, or the optical unit is spirally wound and intersected while two bundle members intersect It is glued and bundled at the position where Since the optical unit is bundled with a bundle material wound around a bundle of optical fiber cores, if the bundle material is picked and pulled, the optical unit can be taken out and pulled from the cable jacket. In order to peel off, it is not necessary to pick and take out the optical fiber itself. Therefore, the optical fiber core wire can be taken out from the optical fiber cable without damaging the optical fiber core wire.
(2) The number of the bundle material is one, and it is wound around the optical unit in a spiral shape, and the winding pitch by the bundle material is 100 mm or less. When the winding pitch of the bundle material is 100 mm or less, the sense of unity between the optical fiber core wire and the bundle material is increased, and the optical fiber core wire can be easily taken out.

(3) The number of the bundle material is two, one of the bundle materials is spirally wound around the optical unit, and the other bundle material is in the opposite direction to the one bundle material, It is wound around the optical unit in a spiral shape, and the winding pitch by the one and the other bundle material is 200 mm or less. The bundle material is wound so as to intersect with each other, and if the bundle material wound earlier is picked and pulled out, the bundle material wound later can be pulled out together, so that the optical fiber core wire can be taken out more easily. For this reason, even if the pitch is made longer than when wound with one bundle material, the sense of unity between the optical fiber core wire and the bundle material is not impaired. In the case of cross winding, the winding pitch by the bundle material can be made longer than that in the case of single winding, so that the production line speed can be increased, the production time can be shortened, and the production efficiency can be increased.

(4) The number of the bundle material is two, one of the bundle materials is spirally wound around the optical unit, and the other bundle material is in the opposite direction to the one bundle material, A winding pitch by the one and the other bundle material, having an adhesive portion that is spirally wound around the optical unit, and the one bundle material is bonded at a position intersecting the other bundle material. Is 300 mm or less. Since the intersections of the cross windings are bonded, the optical unit can be taken out by picking either the first or the rear bundle material. Therefore, the optical fiber core wire can be taken out more easily. When the intersections are bonded by cross-winding, the winding pitch of the bundle material can be made longer than when the intersection points are not bonded by cross-winding, so the production line speed can be further increased and production efficiency can be further increased Can do.

[Details of the embodiment of the present invention]
(First embodiment)
Hereinafter, preferred embodiments of an optical fiber cable according to the present invention will be described with reference to the accompanying drawings.
FIG. 1 is a diagram showing an example of an optical fiber cable according to the first embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating an example of an optical unit in which optical fiber cores are collected, and FIG. 3 is an explanatory diagram when the optical unit is taken out from the optical fiber cable of the first embodiment.

The optical fiber cable 1 is formed, for example, with a self-supporting structure in which a main body 2 and a support wire 3 are connected by a neck 4. In addition, this invention is applicable also to the structure of only the main-body part 2 which does not have the support line part 3 and the neck part 4, like the optical fiber cable for indoors.
The main body 2 has an optical unit 10 at the center, and a pair of tension members (also referred to as strength members) 12 are provided on both sides of the optical unit 10, and are integrally formed with a cable jacket (also referred to as a sheath) 11. It is covered.

  A steel wire 3 a made of a single core wire or a stranded wire is used for the support wire portion 3, and the center of the steel wire 3 a is disposed, for example, on an extension line of a line connecting the centers of the optical unit 10 and the tension member 12. The The support wire jacket 3 b is made of the same resin material as that of the cable jacket 11 and is provided together with the neck portion 4 when the cable jacket 11 is extruded.

As shown in FIG. 2, the optical unit 10 is formed by collecting, for example, eight optical fiber core wires 13 and winding a bundle material 20 around the optical fiber core wires 13.
For example, the optical fiber core 13 is a glass fiber having a standard outer diameter of 125 μm that is coated with a coating outer diameter of about 250 μm, and is further coated with a colored coating on the outside. However, the present invention is not limited to this, and a thin fiber having a coating outer diameter of about 165 μm or 200 μm may be used. Further, the number of cores of the optical fiber core wire can be selected from any number of cores such as 2 cores and 4 cores.

  Further, instead of the optical fiber core wire 13, an optical fiber tape core wire or an intermittent tape core wire may be used. The optical fiber ribbon is obtained by integrating a plurality of optical fibers arranged in a tape with a common coating. The intermittent tape core wire is formed by arranging a plurality of optical fiber core wires in parallel and intermittently connecting adjacent optical fiber core wires by a connecting portion and a non-connecting portion. In addition, it is not necessary to provide a connection part and a non-connection part for every 1 core, for example, you may provide for every 2 cores.

  The bundle material 20 is made of, for example, polyester having a melting point higher than that of the cable jacket 11, and is formed to have a thickness that can be picked up with a fingertip, for example. In FIG. 2, the bundle material 20 having a smaller diameter than the optical fiber core wire 13 is shown, but it may be formed with a larger diameter than the optical fiber core wire 13. Further, if the color different from the color used for the colored coating of the optical fiber core wire 13 is used, the bundle material 20 can be easily identified.

Further, as shown in FIG. 2, the bundle member 20 is spirally wound around the bundle of the optical fiber core wires 13 at a rotation speed corresponding to a predetermined pitch (also referred to as single winding). The winding pitch P by the bundle material 20 is set to a short pitch of, for example, 20 mm or more and 100 mm or less as picked by a fingertip.
As described above, when the winding pitch of the bundle material 20 is set to a short pitch of 100 mm or less, the sense of unity between the optical fiber core wire 13 and the bundle material 20 is enhanced, and the bundle of the optical fiber core wires 13 can be easily taken out. be able to.

  The tension members 12 are arranged on both sides of the optical unit 10 substantially in parallel along the longitudinal direction of the optical unit 10. For the tension member 12, for example, a steel wire, FRP (Fiber Reinforced Plastics), or the like is used as a wire having a resistance to tension or compression.

The cable jacket 11 constitutes a covering of the main body 2 and covers the optical unit 10 and the tension member 12 with a hard resin (for example, made of polyethylene) by extrusion molding.
A pair of notches 14 for tearing the jacket are provided at, for example, the central portion of the surface of the main body 2. The notch 14 is formed in a V-shaped cross section, and the tip located on the bisector of the V shape faces in a direction perpendicular to the direction (vertical direction) connecting the centers of the two tension members 12. Facing the center of the optical unit 10.

When the optical fiber core wire 13 is taken out from the optical fiber cable 1 shown in FIG. 1, the cable jacket 11 around the notch 14 is picked with a fingertip, for example, and the portion of the notch 14 is torn to bisect the cable jacket 11. .
When the cable jacket 11 is divided into two at the position of the notch 14, as shown in FIG. 3A, for example, the side opposite to the support line portion 3 (the lower side of the optical unit 10) of the optical unit 10 is exposed.

Next, as shown in FIG. 3B, when the bundle material 20 seen from the exposed optical unit 10 is picked by, for example, a fingertip and pulled downward, the bundle material 20 is pulled downward, and the optical unit 10 is also pulled. The force is applied, and the optical unit 10 is completely separated from the cable jacket 11 as shown in FIG.
Subsequently, if the bundle material 20 is removed from the taken-out optical unit 10, the optical fiber core wire 13 can be taken out separately.

  Thus, since the optical unit 10 is bundled with the bundle material 20 wound around the bundle of the eight optical fiber core wires 13, for example, if the bundle material 20 is picked and pulled out, the optical unit 10 is The optical fiber core wire 13 itself does not need to be picked and taken out in order to be removed from the cable jacket 11. Therefore, the optical fiber core wire 13 can be taken out from the optical fiber cable 1 without damaging the optical fiber core wire 13.

By the way, you may wind with two bundle materials.
Specifically, in the example shown in FIG. 4, one bundle material 20 (also referred to as a lower thread) is spirally wound around the bundle of optical fiber core wires 13 at a rotation speed corresponding to a predetermined pitch. The other bundle material 21 (also referred to as upper thread) is spirally wound around the bundle of optical fiber core wires 13 in a direction opposite to the one bundle material 20 at a rotation speed corresponding to a predetermined pitch. (Also called cross winding).

If the bundle material 20 is wound and the bundle material 21 is wound immediately thereafter, the bundle materials 20 and 21 can be wound at substantially the same timing.
Thus, in the form in which the bundle members 20 and 21 are wound so as to cross each other, if the bundle member 20 wound earlier is picked and pulled out, the bundle member 21 wound later can be pulled out together, so that the optical fiber core The wire 13 can be taken out more easily. For this reason, even if the pitch is made longer than when wound with one bundle material, the sense of unity between the optical fiber core wire 13 and the bundle material 20 is not impaired.

That is, the winding pitch P by the bundle material 20 is set at a middle pitch of, for example, 20 mm or more and 200 mm or less.
In this way, in the case of cross winding, the winding pitch by the bundle material 20 can be made longer than in the case of single winding, so that the production line speed can be increased and the production cost can be reduced. .

  In FIG. 4, the bundle materials 20 and 21 are both shown at the same pitch, but the bundle material 21 wound later may have a shorter pitch than the bundle material 20 wound earlier.

  Moreover, although the said embodiment demonstrated the example of the cross winding by the bundle materials 20 and 21, all can also be wound in the spiral of the same direction. In this case, the pitch of each bundle material may be shifted by about a half pitch, for example.

Alternatively, as shown in FIG. 5, one bundle material 20 may be bonded at a position where it intersects with the other bundle material 21. The bonded portion 22 is bonded by, for example, fusing the bundle materials 20 and 21 with heat, or bonded and cured by irradiating ultraviolet rays before the cable jacket 11 is extruded. It can be formed.
In this way, by bonding the intersection points of the cross windings, the optical unit 10 can be taken out by picking either the previous bundle material 20 or the subsequent bundle material 21. Therefore, the optical fiber core wire 13 can be taken out more easily.

For this reason, when it has the adhesion part 22, the winding pitch P by the bundle materials 20 and 21 is set to a long pitch of, for example, 20 mm or more and 300 mm or less.
In this way, when the intersection point is bonded by cross winding, the winding pitch by the bundle materials 20 and 21 can be made longer than when the intersection point is not bonded by cross winding, so that the production line speed can be further increased. Further, the manufacturing cost can be further reduced.

(Second Embodiment)
In FIG. 1, an example in which the optical fiber core wire 13 is partially buried in the cable jacket 11 has been described. However, the present invention is also applicable when the optical fiber core wire 13 is not buried in the cable jacket 11.
Specifically, the optical fiber cable 1 shown in FIG. 6 is provided with an inclusion 15 and an intervening tape 16 around the optical unit 10.

Two intervening tapes 16 are arranged in a direction parallel to the direction (longitudinal direction) connecting the centers of the two tension members 12 and sandwich the optical unit 10 therebetween. The intervening tape 16 is a tape-shaped member made of, for example, polyethylene terephthalate (PET), and can protect the optical unit 10 inside the cable jacket 11 during extrusion or when the optical fiber cable 1 is branched.
In addition, as shown in FIG. 6, you may have two pairs of notches 14 formed on both sides of the cable jacket 11 located between the tension member 12 and the optical unit 10.

  The inclusion 15 is a fibrous member made of polyethylene (PE), for example, and is disposed in the direction connecting the centers of the two tension members 12 (vertical direction), and sandwiches the optical unit 10. The inclusion 15 may be a resin yarn such as polypropylene (PP) or polyethylene terephthalate (PET), but may not be a resin.

(Third embodiment)
Alternatively, as shown in FIG. 7, two inclusions 15 are arranged in a direction parallel to the direction (longitudinal direction) connecting the centers of the two tension members 12 in the same manner as the intervention tape 16 described in FIG. The optical unit 10 and the intervening tape 16 may be provided.

(Fourth embodiment)
In FIG. 1, an example in which one optical unit 10 is arranged has been described. However, in the present invention, a plurality of optical units 10 may be arranged.
Specifically, as shown in FIG. 8, the main body 2 has, for example, two optical units 10. The optical unit 10 has the same structure as that described with reference to FIG. 1 and the like, and is arranged in a line along a direction (vertical direction) connecting the centers of the two tension members 12.

  The embodiment disclosed this time should be considered as illustrative in all points and not restrictive. The scope of the present invention is defined by the terms of the claims, rather than the meanings described above, and is intended to include any modifications within the scope and meaning equivalent to the terms of the claims.

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... Optical fiber cable, 2 ... Main-body part, 3 ... Support wire part, 3a ... Steel wire, 3b ... Support wire jacket, 4 ... Neck part, 10 ... Optical unit, 11 ... Cable jacket, 12 ... Tension member, 13 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS Optical fiber core wire, 14 ... Notch, 15 ... Inclusion, 16 ... Interposition tape, 20, 21 ... Bundle material, 22 ... Adhesive part.

Claims (4)

An optical fiber comprising an optical unit in which a plurality of optical fiber cores are collected, two tension members disposed on both sides of the optical unit, and a cable jacket provided around the optical unit A cable,
The optical unit is spirally wound and bundled in one direction with one or a plurality of bundle members, or the optical unit is wound spirally with two bundle members intersecting each other. An optical fiber cable in which the optical unit is wound in a spiral shape while two bundle members cross each other, and are bonded and bundled at a crossing position.   2. The optical fiber cable according to claim 1, wherein the number of the bundle material is one, the wire is spirally wound around the optical unit, and a winding pitch of the bundle material is 100 mm or less.   The bundle material is two, one of the bundle materials is spirally wound around the optical unit, and the other bundle material is in a direction opposite to the one bundle material, and the optical unit The optical fiber cable according to claim 1, wherein the winding pitch of the one and the other bundle members is 200 mm or less. The bundle material is two, one of the bundle materials is spirally wound around the optical unit, and the other bundle material is in a direction opposite to the one bundle material, and the optical unit Is wound around in a spiral manner and has an adhesive portion where the one bundle material is bonded to the other bundle material, and the winding pitch of the one and other bundle materials is 300 mm or less The optical fiber cable according to claim 1, wherein

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