Method for providing stable package of elongated optical fiber with bonded convolutions

A method of providing a stable package comprising a plurality of convolutions of optical fiber, said method comprising:

• advancing optical fiber which includes at least one layer of a suitable coating material long a path of travel;
• applying an adhesive material which exhibits viscoelastic behavior to an outer surface of the coating material of the optical fiber as it is advanced along the path of travel, said adhesive material being such that it is in a non-tacky state at ambient temperature and has a modulus which varies with respect to time and temperature and is such that, upon suitable treatment, interpenetration of polymer chains, which is capable of being tuned by treatment correlated to exposure to a predetermined elevated temperature for a predetermined length of time to achieve a desired level of adhesion between adhesive material on contiguous portions of the optical fiber, is caused to occur;
• causing the adhesive material to become non-tacky;
• taking up the optical fiber to which the adhesive material has been applied in a plurality of convolutions;
• paying out and then winding the optical fiber to which the adhesive material has been applied in a precision wound package;
• and
• subsequently, treating the precision wound optical fiber with the adhesive material applied thereto by exposing wound convolutions to a predetermined temperature for a predetermined length of time to cause interpenetration of polymer chains of the adhesive material to occur between contiguous portions of adjacent convolutions which cause the adhesive material to hold the convolutions together when said package is cooled to a temperature substantially less than the elevated temperature at which molecular bonding occurs with a level of adhesion which has been tuned by the exposure to the predetermined temperature for the predetermined time to provide a degree of interpenetration of polymeric chains of the adhesive material across boundaries of contiguous portions which is sufficient to provide a stable package and which allows each convolution to be separated from contiguous convolutions and payed out without entanglement and without damage to the coated optical fiber.