Optical waveguides – Accessories – Splice box and surplus fiber storage/trays/organizers/ carriers
Reexamination Certificate
2000-10-26
2002-02-26
Spyrou, Cassandra (Department: 2872)
Optical waveguides
Accessories
Splice box and surplus fiber storage/trays/organizers/ carriers
C385S136000, C174S068300
Reexamination Certificate
active
06351592
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates, in general, to communication equipment.
2. Description of the Art
Data and/or voice communication frequently employ an enclosure or cabinet mounted at a convenient location in a facility, such as a manufacturing plant, to provide interconnection between copper conductors and fiberoptic conductors.
FIGS. 1 and 2
depict a prior art communication cabinet which provides interconnections between copper conductors and fiberoptic conductors. The cabinet
10
is a typical NEMA enclosure formed of a back wall
12
, side walls
14
,
16
,
18
and
20
, a front wall
22
in the form of a narrow flange surrounding an opening
24
to the interior of the cabinet
10
, and a door
26
pivotally connected along the one side edge of the front wall
22
. A back plate
28
is mounted on the back wall
12
and provided a mounting surface for various components.
A plurality of fiberoptic connectors
30
, such as conventional SC or ST type fiberoptic connectors, are mounted on the side walls
16
with a jack portion
32
of each connector
30
projecting outwardly from the side wall
16
for receiving a plug termination at one end of a fiberoptic cable, not shown. As is conventional, a typical fiberoptic cable includes
12
individual fiberoptic conductors contained within a thick outer sheath. The sheath is cut back a considerable distance from the end to enable each individual fiberoptic conductors to be attached to a plug for connection to the respective jacks
32
on the side wall
16
. This exposes a portion of the thinner, flexible fiberoptic conductors which made the conductors prone to damage or breakage when hit by external objects. In addition, the external mounting of the jack and fiberoptic conductor plug termination do not provide any strain relief thereby increasing the possibility of the fiberoptic conductors breaking free of the respective jacks if subjected to an external force.
A plurality of copper connectors
38
were also mounted on the cabinet
10
, generally on the side wall
14
. The copper conductor connectors
38
were of typical construction, such as a RJ45 jack. Finally, a plurality of light emitting diodes (LEDs)
40
are mounted on the side wall
14
to provide an indication of the operative state of certain components within the cabinet
10
.
A 48 VDC power receptacle
42
is mounted on the side wall
16
for receiving a plug connected to a 48 volt DC power supply. Internal conductors connect the receptacle
42
to a pair of power supplies
44
mounted on the back plate
28
. The power supplies
44
provide regulated 24 VDC and 12 VDC power to circuit breakers connected to copper/fiberoptic converters and a radio, as described hereafter.
The circuit breakers
46
are mounted in a housing
48
on the back plate
28
and individually connected to the 24 VDC and 12 VDC power supplies and to each copper/fiberoptic converter and the radio by individual wires extending from each circuit breaker
46
through terminals
50
to the power connections of each converter
52
and the radio.
Individual conductors are wired from each fiberoptic connector
30
and each copper connector
38
to the respective copper conductor and fiberoptic conductor connections on each converter
52
. In addition, individual conductors are wired from each indicator or LED
40
to each component whose status was to be monitored, such as each circuit breaker
46
, each converter
52
, each power supply
44
; etc.
As is evident from
FIG. 1
, the communications cabinet
10
requires a considerable amount of individual wiring and terminations to connect the circuit breakers
46
and the LEDs
40
to each component within the cabinet as well as to connect the power supplies
44
to the circuit breakers
46
. This amount of wiring not only increased the manufacturing costs due to the considerable length of time required to initially construct and wire the cabinet
10
, but the conductors are prone to faults which require a considerable amount of trouble shooting time to locate and correct. In addition, the converters
52
are individually hard wired to the circuit breakers
46
via the terminals
50
. All of these problems were in addition to the problems are described above with respect to the external mounting of the individual copper and fiberoptic conductors to the respective copper and fiberoptic connectors.
Thus, it would be desirable to provide a communications cabinet or enclosure which overcomes the problems of previously devised, communications enclosures. It would be desirable to provide a communications enclosure which has a considerable amount of pre-wiring connections provided in a printed circuit board as well as providing plug-in connections between the power converters and the circuit board to minimize the amount of individual wires and assembly time required to construct the communications cabinet.
SUMMARY
The present invention is a communications cabinet which provides connections between fiberoptic conductors, copper conductors, and copper/fiber converters.
According to one aspect of the invention, the communications cabinet includes a housing having walls. A plurality of copper/fiberoptic converters are mounted in the housing. Sealable access means are also mounted in the housing for sealingly enclosing the passage of fiberoptic and copper conductors through at least one wall of the housing. In this aspect, each of the sealable access means includes a pair of resilient members, each mounted on a bracket and facing the opposed resilient member. The resilient members and brackets are movable relative to each other between a first spaced apart position allowing passage of an electrical conductor through an adjacent aperture in the housing wall into the interior of the housing, and a second closed position wherein the resilient members sealingly encompass substantially the entire peripheral surface of the conductor extending therethrough.
A clip may be mountable over the brackets when the brackets and the resilient members are in the second closed position to forcibly retain the brackets and the resilient members in the closed position. According to this aspect of the invention, the clip comprises a pair of clips attachable to spaced portions of the brackets. In another aspect, the clip is in the form of an elongated, single member extending over a substantial portion of each bracket pair. An aperture is formed in the elongated clip allowing a conductor extending through the aperture in the housing and the resilient members to pass through the clip. In this embodiment, the clip provides strain relief to the conductor.
According to another aspect of the present invention, the fiberoptic and copper conductors, each have an end disposed in the housing terminating in a first electrical connector. A plurality of conductors extend from the copper/fiber converters, each terminating in a second connector. A plurality of third connectors are mounted in the housing for interconnecting one first connector and one second connector. Preferably, the third connectors are arranged in a plurality of groups in the housing, one group exclusively receiving the connectors on the copper conductors and one group exclusively receiving the connectors on the fiberoptic conductors. According to another unique aspect of the invention, a barrier is mounted within the housing dividing the housing into two separate compartments. The third connectors are preferably mounted on the barrier.
According to another aspect of the present invention, a printed circuit board is mounted in the housing and carries conductive traces. The conductive traces complete an electrical circuit between input power connections and each converter. Preferably, connectors are carried on the printed circuit board each in electrical connection with one conductive trace and receive one converter in a snap-in connection. According to this aspect of the invention, an aperture is formed in the printed circuit board having opposed side edges. The connectors are mounted on one side ed
Ehn Michael W.
Theisen Todd
Cherry Euncha
Netrix Technologies, Inc.
Spyrou Cassandra
Young & Basile PC
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