Lineman Forum: Fiber splicing pic's - Lineman Forum

Just got into the fiber side so I'm posting some pic's for the veterans to give me some criticizm! How do they look?

Later-
"Dawg"leg aka micro-bend

That is a nice looking tray Dawg, are you working for the phone company? I noticed the tray said CO and not Headend.
Any way, you'll thank your self for taking the time to make you tray as neat as possible, nothing sucks worse than finding a rats nest after opening a splice case.
BTW, I learned the term headend on this site. Thanks CATV guy's

Looks good Dogleg one thing you may want to think over is how you wrap your fiber before you put it into the splint holders, when you go in next time to remove a couple strands and splice it into a different cable it will be awful hard to dig them out one at a time. I have found from my own mistakes that storing that much slack makes it hard.

Here is how I have been doing it for the last 3 years or so.

This post has been edited by Norscaner: 30 April 2005 - 07:36 AM

Just noticed on your packs between rose & violet and between black and yellow sneak your holders right up against each other that way when you add another pak holder to do a transfer you dont have to rearrange your strands and rebuild exisitng glass which can be a major pain in the \

If you build your splice with your low count at the top ... just the opposite to what you have now , any additions can be placed close to the hinged part of the tray. Makes it easy to add and delete strands and you dont have to unwind the glass already spliced.

These are things I learned form planners mistakes and lots of hours of cussing out people with education and no field smarts. Diplomas are good if you need something to start a fire, give me a guy with field smarts and watch us make things happen.

Nice neat bends and loops! A little tip, get some 7" tywraps, when you have to move the splices around on the fiber management tray those little tywraps the installers use are perfect for moving and separating splices without touching or breaking them. Good luck

Hey thanks for the info Norscaner. Yeah these pics were of my very first FDH about 7 months ago. And I did have to reenter it and it was a pain! I've since then been wrapping my trays the same as you are. They look a lot better as well as being functional! I'll post some more pic's of how I've improved this week. I've also started using those tubes you put around your buffers instead of the felt that Verizon wants us to use. Are you working on a Verizon FTTP project as well??

"Dawg"leg

Good to hear Dogleg , nothing more stressful then having to have to go back into working circuits and break 6 dead strands and reroute them into another cable. I do use a tool to tell me if the strands have traffic on them but it has lied to me on a couple different occasions.
Right now we are working on fibre into different SAC areas to bring video to the neighbourhood. We are still a ways from FTTP or FTTH. Most of our SAC boxes are fiber fed but with video comming online we need more glass ,which suits me just fine .
Being an independant telco the fellas in the field pretty well direct what kind of equipment we use for splicing so it is a little easier for me to decide on how things are done on the splicing end of it. One thing you may consider doing is using more trays in the closure. If at all possible it makes life easier and always leave a space to transfer more cable into a tray. Just when they tell you they will never add another cable some other planner comes along and says "sorry but we have to:.
I look forward to the updated pics.

Another note aquarum air tube is real cheap and makes good buffer tube and you cut it to the length you want, use hotglove powder to make it easier to get the buffer tubes through the clear tubing. In a pinch PLP grease on the buffer tube works to but be sure to remove it all with alcohol or d gel.

This post has been edited by Norscaner: 01 May 2005 - 02:18 PM

Yeah all the Tyco Enclosures we are using come with an abundance of that tubing in the box so there isn't a shortage. I've just been hitting the tubes with d-gel and they have been sliding right on. I'd love to use more trays but Verizon is to cheap! They want us to pack as many splices in a tray as possible. Which I guess is understandable considering the billions they're spending on all these projects. We have to put at least 72 splices per tray and 108 in the thick ribbon trays. There is also been talk of ribbonizing everything to save on trays & sleeves. Any thoughts/suggestions on that? I've heard some horror stories about it being difficult and time consuming. I've also heard its cake and is super fast. Very contradicting stories. See the way our plant is designed we have a 432 ribbon leaving a cabinet and feeding abunch of loose tube cables. I just did a cabinet the other day with 360 burns, and with breaking the ribbon apart and single splicing it took me two days. Now, last week I did a 432 mass fusion in about 8 hours. The way I look @ it in the time it takes to peel my ribbon and burn 12 fibers, I could ribbonize and do 1 burn in half the time right? Also, got an easy way/tool to open armored fiber?


Thanks-
"Dawg"leg

When you say armored fiber? do you mean the cable or the actual fiber its self? If your just talking about he cable they sell a good tool that looks like a pair of vice grips with a blade on it that is adjustable up and down and you can rotate it as well. Works amazing for Mid-Sheaths and new preps. The ones we use are called Jones Tools. i used to use them on copper and then started using them on fiber and have never had a problem. Just watch your depth cause you can go too deep and cut tubes. My rule of thumb is tighten it down until the blade touches the sheath and then lower the blade a full turn. Also i have a question for you guys, why are you transitioning the fiber in to rubber tubes? I couldn't tell what kind of fiber cable you were working with, but i don't under stand why you wouldn't run the buffer tube all the way to the tray? But i guess if its a central tube it does make since. Hope i helped a little bit. Also tyco/rachem make different manifolds they sell one that holes 12 splices instead of 6, when you order the case/trays you can specify. But if not you can always stack them haha.