The use of optical fibers for the transmission of voice, data, and video information has increased dramatically in recent years. The heart of such transmission systems is an optical fiber of silica glass or other suitable material that has been clad with an appropriate material to create a waveguide along which light energy can travel in a controlled manner. Optical fibers are extremely small (in the order of microns in diameter) and when they are incorporated into a transmission system it is necessary to effect interconnections between separate lengths of such fibers, or between fiber and active transmitters or receivers.
With the greatly expanding deployment of optical fiber transmission systems and the continual miniaturization of electronics, it has become increasingly necessary to provide a higher density of optical cable connections to optoelectronic transmission equipment.
Since most optoelectronic equipment is rack mounted, traditional fiber optic cable connections to optoelectronic equipment has been to the equipment""s vertically mounted front panel, or faceplate. FIG. 1 illustrates the prior art for vertically mounted optical interfaces on the faceplate of optoelectronic equipment. FIG. 1 illustrates a side view of a printed circuit board (PCB) 100 containing a multitude of duplex optical interfaces mounted on the PCB faceplate 104. A duplex optical bulkhead connector 105 connects to a PCB transmitter 101 and a PCB receiver 102 via optical fibers 103. A duplex transmitter/receiver module with an integrated bulkhead connector 110 is also shown in FIG. 1 as an alternative optical interface. Other optical interfaces, such as simplex optical bulkhead connectors, are also widely used. The term optical interface is being used to generically describe any of the above optical bulkhead connectors to the PCB 100, as well as other types of optical connectors.
To maximize the useable real estate on the PCB 100, manufacturers commonly mount the optical interface bulkhead connectors 105 or the integrated bulkhead connectors 110 in a vertical configuration, as illustrated in FIG. 1. However, as a result of utilizing the vertical optical interface bulkhead connectors 105 or the integrated bulkhead connectors 110, end users may be exposed to safety issues due to high power lasers at eye level.
Additionally, the natural gravitational affects on fiber optic jumper cables 130 connected to the vertical optical interface bulkhead connectors 105 or the integrated bulkhead connectors 110 can cause microbending losses in the fiber optic jumper cables 130, as depicted by the sharp angle 140 shown in FIG. 1.
Historically, to prevent such microbending, manufacturers of fiber optic jumper cables 130, produce right angle strain relief devices (not illustrated) that attach to the fiber optic jumper cable 130 in the area next to a fiber optic connector 120 which is the area most susceptible to the gravitationally induced sharp angle 140. These right angle strain relief devices are specifically designed for each manufacturer of and type of fiber optic connector 120. Consequently, end users (e.g., telecommunications companies) that use multiple suppliers of optical fiber jumper cables 130, must also keep vendor specific right angle strain relief devices. This is an expense and inconvenience the end user would much prefer to avoid.
To eliminate this right angle strain relief device cost to the end user, some manufacturers cut the PCB 100 in order to angle the optical interface bulkhead connector 105 or the integrated bulkhead connector 110 downward, thereby avoiding the fiber optic jumper cable 130 microbending. This technique, however, results in increased design and manufacturing costs for the PCB 100, and lost PCB 100 real estate.
For this reason there is a need for a fiber optic connector module which can connect to a vertically mounted faceplate and angle downward to eliminate the gravitation microbending effect on an attached generic fiber optic jumper.
A fiber optic connector module is presented that has one or more male fiber optic connectors on one end of a molded body and a corresponding number of female optical connectors on the other end. The molded body can be a fixed angle module made of a material such as plastic, or can be an adjustable angle module where the angle can be adjusted to an angle between 90 degrees and less than 180 degrees.
In one embodiment, the male connector is connected to the female connector with an optical fiber terminated with optical ferrules enclosed within the molded body. Alternative embodiments utilize various passive optical devices to interconnect the male and female connects, such as optical splitters, wave division multiplexers, and optical attenuators. Alternative embodiments substitute a bulkhead connector for the male connector(s) to allow for direct mounting to the optoelectronic equipment faceplate.