Fusion mass-splices for optical fibers using high-frequency discharge

This report describes a high-frequency discharge massheating technique and a fiber aligning mechanism for fusion mass-splicing of silica fibers, and a reinforcement technique for the spliced fibers. Splice loss, operation time, and loss stability of reinforced mass-splices were evaluated by using fiber ribbon units comprising five graded-index fibers with 50-μm core and 125-μm outer diameters. They proved the excellence of the method.