We report on a new class of novel optical fiber structures, designed for use in harsh environments typical of oil and gas applications. Specifically, we focus on fiber designs that alleviate the effects of hydrogen ingression and its associated darkening of optical fibers in harsh environments. We demonstrate, theoretically, how a carbon-coated optical fiber structure, consisting of an array of randomly or systematically placed voids running along the length of the fiber, can lead to significantly reduced hydrogen ingression effects. The array of voids can be of arbitrarily varying shapes and sizes along the length of the fiber.
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This blog summarizes the four key problems of metal-coated fibers and how AFL's specialty fibers address these challenges.

Verrillon VHT500 is a pure silica core single-mode design with a protective metal coating that allows it to operate at temperatures up to 500°C.

The VHT5000 product is a specialty optical fiber that has ultimate performance multimode fiber with metallic coating, rated for 500°C service.

This series consists of an 80 µm cladding fiber design that exhibits extremely low macro-bend loss and high compatibility with standard 125 µm standard single-mode fibers.

Demonstration of low attenuation metal-coated optical fiber and cable capable of withstanding temperatures up to 500°C. Performance will be validated by using a DTS instrument to measure temperature.

This paper will demonstrate a metal-coated fiber capable of withstanding temperatures up to 500°C.

The recently released Fujikura PCS-100 is a novel stripping tool for removing polyimide coating from optical fibers.

By using CO2 laser fusion technology, many components with extreme geometries and critical requirements, which were very hard to make in the past, can now be easily manufactured.

AFL's unique patented PZ Fiber design offers very broad polarizing bandwidth (~200nm), high exstinction ratio (>40 dB), low attenuation and does not require bending to operate.

Optical fibers have been used in the petroleum industry for years and in this paper we demonstrate improved reliability of recently developed hermetic, high operating temperature optical fiber.

Optical fibers with improved hermeticity, strength and chemical resistance are presented.