Fixed fiber-optic attenuators

Fixed optical attenuators used in fiber optic systems may use a variety of principles for their functioning. Preferred attenuators use either doped fibers, or mis-aligned splices, since both of these are reliable and inexpensive. Inline style attenuators are incorporated into patch cables. The alternative build out style attenuator is a small male-female adapter that can be added on to other cables.

Non-preferred attenuators often use gap loss or reflective principles. Such devices can be sensitive to: modal distribution, wavelength, contamination, vibration, temperature, damage due to power bursts, may cause back reflections, may cause signal dispersion etc.

July 14, 2011

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