Elastic tube splice:

• The elastic tube splice shown cross sectionally in the figure below is a unique device that automatically performs lateral, longitudinal and angular alignment. .
• It splices multimode fibers with losses in the same range as commercial fusion splices, but much less equipment and skill are needed.

• The splice mechanism is basically a tube made of elastic material. The central hole diameter is slightly smaller than that of the fiber to be spliced and is tapered on each end for easy fiber insertion.
• When the fiber is inserted, it expands the hole diameter so that the elastic material exerts a symmetrical force on the fiber.
• This symmetry feature allows an accurate and automatic alignment of the axes of the two joined fibers.
• A wide range of diameters can be inserted into the elastic tube. Thus the fibers to be spliced do not have to be equal in diameter, since each fiber moves into position independently relative to the tube axis.