Fully Understand the Fabrication Process of Fiber Array FA

The processing process of fiber array is that the exposed optical fiber part with the optical fiber coating removed is placed in the V-shaped groove, pressed by the pressed part, and bonded by adhesive, and finally, the surface is ground and polished to the required precision.

Structure of fiber array

The v-groove fiber array is mainly composed of V-groove bottom plate, cover plate, optical fiber and glue.

Where are the main applications of fiber array?

Fiber array unit is usually used in planar optical waveguides, arrayed waveguide gratings, active/passive array fiber devices, micro-electromechanical systems, multi-channel optical modules, and so on. Among them, fiber arrays are one of the important components of planar optical waveguide splitter, which can greatly reduce the loss of optical waveguide devices and optical coupling alignment.

Arrangement devices and methods of fiber array

1. Substrate film pasting

Use 1.0MM or 1.5mm JGS2 Shi Ying glass or BF33, bk7, etc., and place it in the upper center of the pasting equipment for pasting, and take out the pasted substrate after the operation is completed.

2. Open the steps

The product is placed in the grinding machine adsorption tray, and the four directions do not exceed the vacuum tray.

3. Slotting

Generally, there are two kinds of cutting tools, one is the cutting tool, the other is the V-shaped tool, which is mainly used for grooving and chamfering. Grooving can use 60 and 90°V-shaped tools, and chamfering can also be used for 60 or 90, and generally 90 chamfering takes the majority.

Generally, 600-mesh, 800-mesh and 1,000-mesh cutters are used for roughness, 600 mesh or 800 mesh can be used for slotting. 600-mesh, 800-mesh and 1,000-mesh cutters can be used for cutting, and for cutting off the middle of V-groove, so as to reduce the edge damage of V-groove.

After the equipment is started, confirm the tool of the equipment. Generally, the blade angle is 60 or 90. After the tool test, the range of 60° cutting tool is 58~65°（90°±3°）), which can be used. If the angle exceeds it, the tool should be replaced. If there is a special angle, it can be processed according to the actual requirements.

4. Equipment operation

Enter the equipment operation interface and select manual cutting (semi-automatic cutting). After copying, paste and modify the file name and modify the required equipment cutting program.

5. Core Pitch

Core Pitch refers to the distance between one fiber and another fiber, including the distance between adjacent channels and the distance between nonadjacent channels. At the same time, because processing V-groove requires high-precision equipment, the more channels, the lower pitch accuracy will be. By testing VG's position error with equipment, the control of products during processing can be ensured.

6. FA assembly

Strip the ribbon fiber, peel off the fiber core, put the fiber array into the V groove, and fix the fiber position with the cover plate.

7. Glue distribution

Generally, two or three kinds of glues are used to fix and protect the high power optical fiber.

8. End grinding

The angle of grinding end face is divided into-8 or 8, 0, etc. Generally, flatness < 200 nm, fiber height < 200 nm, angle range of 0.3 or 0.5 are required.