Characteristics of Optical Fibers Jacketed with a Thermoplastic Resin Filled with Potassium Titanate Whiskers

This paper describes the properties of a new material for optical fiber jacket and those of jacketed optical fibers. The new material, which is thermoplastic resin filled with potassium titanate whiskers, can be easily extruded by ordinary extruder and colored by ordinary method as well. The jacket consisting of this material has a small linear expansion coefficient, thus the optical fibers jacketed with this material are quite superior to temperature characteristics where the fibers show no significant loss increase even at temperature characteristics where the fibers show no significant loss increase evenat temperatures as low as -60 C. The lateral force characteristics of the fibers are also improved because of enhanced Young's modulus of the jacket. Furthermore, the optical fibers jacketed with this material preserves sufficient flexibility and handling performances on the same level as conventional nylon jacketed fibers. (Author)