What an OTDR can do for you?

The Optical Time Domain Reflectometer (OTDR) is useful for testing the integrity of fiber optic cables. An optical time-domain reflectometer (OTDR) is an optoelectronic instrument used to characterize an optical fiber. An OTDR is the optical equivalent of an electronic time domain reflectometer. It injects a series of optical pulses into the fiber under test. It also extracts, from the same end of the fiber, light that is scattered (Rayleigh backscatter) or reflected back from points along the fiber. The strength of the return pulses is measured and integrated as a function of time, and plotted as a function of fiber length.

Using an OTDR, we can:

1. Measure the distance to a fusion splice, mechanical splice, connector, or significant bend in the fiber.

2. Measure the loss across a fusion splice, mechanical splice, connector, or significant bend in the fiber.

3. Measure the intrinsic loss due to mode-field diameter variations between two pieces of single-mode optical fiber connected by a splice or connector.

4. Determine the relative amount of offset and bending loss at a splice or connector joining two single-mode fibers.

5. Determine the physical offset at a splice or connector joining two pieces of single-mode fiber, when bending loss is insignificant.

6. Measure the optical return loss of discrete components, such as mechanical splices and connectors.

7. Measure the integrated return loss of a complete fiber-optic system.

8. Measure a fiber’s linearity, monitoring for such things as local mode-field pinch-off.

9. Measure the fiber slope, or fiber attenuation (typically expressed in dB/km).

10. Measure the link loss, or end-to-end loss of the fiber network.

11. Measure the relative numerical apertures of two fibers.

12. Make rudimentary measurements of a fiber’s chromatic dispersion.

13. Measure polarization mode dispersion.

14. Estimate the impact of reflections on transmitters and receivers in a fiber-optic system.

15. Provide active monitoring on live fiber-optic systems.

16. Compare previously installed waveforms to current traces.