Performance of Polymer Optical Fibers under Extreme Conditions

The performance of two modern polymer optical fibers was studied under demanding conditions including repeated bending with 2 mm radius in temperature range of -35 degC to 85 degC and pulling until failure. Also studied was if the changes in refractive index profile due to high stresses caused by tight radius bending would be large enough to affect the fiber performance. The tests showed that the 250 mum thick PMMA based sample fibers were able to survive the demanded 100,000 bends with temperature cycling without significantly increasing their attenuation. The fibers were also able to keep their performance until elongations close to their breaking point. The effect of changes in fiber refractive index profile was found to be insignificant compared to other bending related effects.