Advantages of Glass Optical Fiber | disadvantages of Glass Optical Fiber

This page covers advantages and disadvantages of Glass Optical Fiber (GOF). It mentions Glass Optical Fiber advantages or benefits and Glass Optical Fiber disadvantages or drawbacks.

What is Glass Optical Fiber?

Introduction:
• The fiber optic system consists of three parts viz. light source, medium, light receiver. The medium is where glass optical fiber is used. It is made of long hair like dielectric made of glass or silica structure with circular cross section.
• The cable has three parts viz. central part known as core, cladding which covers core and extreme outer protective jacket. The core part is the medium through which light propagates from one end to the other.

POF vs GOF,Difference between Plastic Optical Fiber and Glass Optical Fiber

• They are made of strands of glass surrounded by specific sheathing (e.g. stainless steel).
• The figure-1 depicts basic structure of glass optical fiber. It operates in infrared wavelength.
• The light wave can travel over greater distances as cladding does not absorb any light from the core. Some of the light degrades within fiber cable due to impurities in the glass. The basis of textile grade glass optical fiber is silica (i.e. SiO₂).
Refer GOF vs POF for difference between glass optical fiber and plastic optical fiber.

Benefits or advantages of Glass Optical Fiber

Following are the benefits or advantages of Glass Optical Fiber:
➨They are durable and withstand low to high temperatures in the range -40^oF to +900^oF. Hence they are useful for high temperature appliances such as ovens, furnaces, condensers etc. as well as low temperature areas such as cold storage warehouses.
➨Due to lower loss per Km (i.e. 2.9 dB/Km), it is preferred for long distance communication.
➨It can support high bandwidth signal transmission. Hence it is ideal for home networking.
➨The glass optical fiber cable is immune to EMI/RFI.
➨They are thin and light in weight. Hence they can be optimized for small spaces and small targets.

Drawbacks or disadvantages of Glass Optical Fiber

Following are the drawbacks or disadvantages of Glass Optical Fiber:
➨The cost of glass fiber is high compare to plastic fiber. Moreover its test equipments are also costlier.
➨Its core diameter is very small (about 0.062 mm), hence it is difficult to couple light in the core region.
➨It is difficult to install and terminate. Moreover connectorization takes longer and requires special tools and training.
➨It is brittle unlike plastic fiber which is flexible.