Optical fiber termination by fusion splicing or mechanical splicing is very common now with the increasing development of fiber optic network. As optical fibers are sensitive to pulling, bending and crushing forces, fiber splice tray is used to provide a safe routing and easy-to-manage environment for the fragile optical fiber splices. In the past, the fiber splice tray was usually installed in a box that mounted to wall. Now, you can find a lot of places in fiber optic network using fiber splice tray. This tutorial is to illustrate where the fiber splice trays are required and how to use them.
What Is Fiber Splice Tray?
Fiber splice tray is generally used to hold and protect individual fiber optic splices. There are mainly two types of fiber optic splices, one is fusion splices, the other one is mechanical splices. Fiber splice trays for fusion splices and mechanical splices are not the same. It is suggested to use specialized fiber splice trays for different fiber splices. Another important factor of fiber splice tray is the fiber count that it can hold. Most fiber splice tray can hold up to 24 fiber splices. 12-fiber splice trays are the most commonly used fiber splice tray in fiber optic network.Where to Use Fiber Splice Tray
For most applications, fiber splice tray is not strong enough to provide robust protection for fiber splices independently, so it is usually used with other components to protect optical fibers. It has low space requirement and has great compatibility. Fiber splice trays are usually used as accessories of other devices, like fiber optic splice closure, fiber distribution box, fiber optic enclosure, etc. The following is to introduce the applications of fiber splice tray in details.Fiber Splice Tray in Fiber Optic Splice Closure
The fiber optic splice closure is component which is widely used in today’s fiber optic network for outdoor applications and harsh environment. It usually contains one or more fiber splice tray to provide space and protection for fiber optic splices. Fiber splice trays used in different fiber optic splice closures could have different designs and fiber counts. Here take the examples of a 96-fiber horizontal fiber optic splice closure and a 24-fiber dome fiber optic splice closure.
The following picture shows the 96-fiber horizontal fiber optic splice closure. It has two input ports and two output ports providing space for 96 fiber splices. There are four standard 24-fiber splice trays stacked together inside the fiber optic splice closure.
The 24-fiber splice closure is shown in the following picture. It has five entries providing up to 24 fiber optic splices in two 12-fiber splice tray. The design of the two fiber splice tray is different from the above ones, which is suitable for the vertical design of the fiber splice closure.
Fiber Splice Tray in Fiber Distribution Box
In FTTx projects, fiber optic cables from service providers are usually required to be connected with the fiber cables deployed near end users. Fiber optic network installers usually splice the feed cable to end users by fiber optic splicing. Fiber distribution box is usually used in FTTx projects to distribute individual fibers to individual end users. Fiber splice tray is usually deployed in fiber distribution box to manage and protect fiber splices as shown in the following picture.
Fiber Splice Tray in Fiber Enclosure
Except the above mentioned two applications, fiber splice tray is also very popular in data center and server room. It is usually evitable to splice fiber optic cables with fiber pigtails in data center, which requires lower space requirement and has a better network performance compared with other fiber optic termination methods. Fiber splice tray is usually installed in fiber enclosure to provide a safe and easy-to-manage environment for fiber splices. Here takes the example of fiber splice tray used in FHD fiber enclosure of as shown in the following picture. It is a 96-fiber enclosure which has four 24-fiber adapter on the front panel. This fiber enclosure can hold up four 24-fiber splice tray to provide the space for 96 fiber optic splices.