No. A typical cable is made up of plastic, cotton, one steel wire and
sometimes a metallic shield to give rodents something to chew on. The
plastic coated fiberglass strands are either organized into ribbons or
grouped into plastic buffer tubes.
Other than the steel wire, there is nothing that a recycler can make use
of. And from a telecom perspective, we would never buy short chunks of
cable or cable that has had evidence of aerial mounting. We usually get our
fiber in at least three mile lengths for direct bury cable, longer for
shooting through ducts as they have thinner jackets. Depending on style of
cable, the jacket thickness can vary a lot. We also have non-metallic
cables that we use around tower sites as we don't want it to interfere with
the groundfield.
We still direct bury a lot of our cable if we're out in the countryside.
Ducts are used in town, under roads, etc. The ducts provide no real
protection, but do allow us to replace segments without having to rebore
the section. Unfortunately, when we get attacked by errant backhoes, a
ducted fiber is prone to damage everywhere in the affected segment whereas
a direct bury cable may only need fifty feet of replacement. We had one
break that was over a mile from where the backhoe snagged it.
Every telecom deals with inventoring the fiber plant differently, and as
contractors are used at least 90% of the time for new construction, we
don't always know for sure what gets snuck into the ground, but knowing
what is out there is pretty important because not only do we have to
inventory each strand in every segment, but every splice point, ped, duct,
and cable position sometimes to the inch. So, we always have a company
inspector watching over the contractors and monitoring the cable types. The
importance of this cannot be underestimated because different claddings
yield different dispersions and may not play well with the latest ROADM and
DWDM technologies. Try lighting up a segment with a ramen amplifier can
yield a cable meltdown if the fiber isn't compatable.
Speaking of contractors, we did have a situation last year where the cable
was stolen out of the ducts in the night after a segment was put in. But
that was an inside job and the fiber was relaid the next day in the next
work location.
AG
On Wednesday, May 28, 2014, Wayne Harridge <
wayne.harridge@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Is there a market for used optical fibre ?
>
--
Ken Norton
ken@xxxxxxxxxxx
http://www.zone-10.com
--
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