Cassette for optical fibers
AssigneeMars Actel
InventorsAlain Vincent, Michel Milanowski
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AssigneeMars Actel
InventorsAlain Vincent, Michel Milanowski
Estimating the term…
A cassette for optical fibers includes a bottom surrounded by discontinuous rim segments between which access channels for the fibers are delimited. Each of the access channels is delimited over a substantially identical width on the bottom by two facing sidewalls. A block projects from the bottom of the cassette and has two side faces facing end portions of corresponding adjacent rim segments at respective corners, thereby forming similar double access channels at the corners. An element of the first type or second type sized to the double access channels is selectively positioned within the double access channels. The element of the first type is constituted by a flexible slab having spaced parallel slots receiving and retaining bare fibers. A channel element of the second type is constituted by a rigid, U-shaped channel section part having two flanges interconnected by a web, with each flange including a series of teeth. The teeth delimit slots receiving and retaining protected fibers.
In a cassette for optical fibers, said cassette including a bottom, two first longitudinally opposite rim segments and two second, laterally opposite rim segments, said rim segments projecting from the same side of the bottom and substantially around a periphery thereof, said rim segments delimiting four corners of the cassette, and at least partially an access channel for the fibers at at least one of the corners, at least one of means on the bottom for coiling said fibers and means for holding connections between coiled fibers, and a slotted access channel element within said at least one access channel for receiving said fibers, said element having slots for individually separating the fibers in parallel and for guiding said fibers, the improvement wherein said cassette includes a block projecting from the bottom and having two side faces facing end portions of corresponding adjacent rim segments at said at least one corner, thereby forming similar double access channels having sides delimited by said two faces of said block and said facing end portions of said adjacent rim segments and constituting sidewalls of two separate access channels at said at least one corner, and wherein said access channel element is sized to fit each of said double access channels for selective positioning within a given one of said double access channels.
A cassette according to claim 18, in which said first rim segments are straight and said second rim segments are curved, and wherein at each double access, an end portion of the first rim segment projects outwardly relative to an end portion of a second rim segment.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.