Following is another traveling bungle with Pipe International's Matt Whitlock and Lee Harper. 

As you have previously read, our trip to Tokyo was not without dramas. I should have been much more careful looking for potential signs of trouble right from the start of the trip.

Lee was flying into Japan from the UK and I from Australia.  We had agreed to meet in the baggage hall of Terminal 2 at Tokyo's Narita airport, as our flights were scheduled to land within 5 minutes of each other. The aircraft landed on schedule and therefore starting the trip off well, but that was all about to change. 

One hour after landing, we were still standing in the baggage hall waiting for Lee's suitcase (see picture)! It turns out that in a fit of madness, Lee had chosen to entrust his suitcase to the baggage handlers of Heathrow's Terminal 5 (http://www.airport-int.com/news/2008/07/10/heathrow-t5-losing-900-bags-a-day). As a result the suitcase was still in London!

We then spent another 30 minutes explaining the colour, style and contents of the bag to the British Airways staff whilst they promised to get it to Tokyo as soon as possible. Because we were only in Japan for 3 days it seemed likely that Lee would arrive back in London while his suitcase was arriving in Japan.

Deciding to put this behind us, we embarked on a shopping tour in Tokyo to buy Lee some new clothes.  Having been in the same clothes for quite a while, he was starting to feel a little crumpled, to say the least.  This in itself was a challenge. 

We found it quite difficult to navigate the shopping districts of Tokyo with a tourist map and Japanese road signs, as well as trying to find a department store which catered for the European sized man. Once we found a store, it became very clear that the average Japanese man is somewhat smaller than Lee, as finding suitable clothes was proving tricky. After much gesturing regarding special offers for buying 3 pairs of socks and 4 shirts, Lee was finally able to put some fresh clothes on and continue with the rest of the evening.

It ended well with Lee and his suitcase being reunited in the hotel about 24 hours before the flight home. "It'll be the first time I've gone home with a suitcase full of clean clothes," he said, looking on the bright side.

Further to our blog of the 20th May 2008, our audience comments have requested further information on Fusion splicing.  

Fusion splicing is the joining of two optical fibres end-to-end using heat. The goal is to fuse the two fibres together in such a way that light passing through the fibres is not scattered or reflected back by the splice, and so that the splice and the region surrounding it are almost as strong as the virgin fibre itself. The source of heat is electric arc, but can also be a tungsten filament through which current is passed.

The PIPE team in the photo is using the FSM-60S Fusion Splicer, a single fibre ARC fusion splicer.  The splicing time on this model is approximately 9 seconds on a standard fibre. It also has a heater to heat-shrink the splice protector. It does this in approximately 30 seconds.  A camera gives a real-time image of the fibres being spliced.

To splice an optical fibre, the following steps are followed:

1.  The coatings of the two fibres to be spliced together must be stripped off to expose the bare glass core.
2. Each fibre must be cleaved so that its endface is perfectly flat and perpendicular to the axis of the fibre.
3. The two fibres are placed in the fusion machine. It then inspects the cleave and aligns the fibres ready to splice.
4. The two fibres are fused together.
5. The bare fibre area is typically protected with a splice protector, although in some cases the coating can be reconstituted.
6. Following the splice operation, the fusion machine strength tests the splice and gives an indicative loss. If the loss is too high, the splice will be broken and the process above repeated.

Alternatives to fusion splicing include using optical fibre connectors or mechanical splices both of which have higher insertion losses, lower reliability and higher return losses than fusion splicing. PIPE does not employ mechanical splicing anywhere in the network.

 From the Sydney CLS to the Guam CLS, our submarine cable will employ a large number of cable joints throughout the route.  In the  submarine cable these cable joints are made using high strength, low loss fusion splices.  The optical splices are enclosed in an undersea joint.

The undersea joints will provide optical, electrical and mechanical continuity between the contiguous undersea cable sections.  The joints are designed for operation in both deep and shallow water and can be handled by the conventional undersea cable machinery for laying and burial, without any degradation of performance.

Our team will use four joint types for the PPC-1 submarine cable. 

• Cable-to-Cable
• Cable-to-Repeater
• Cable End Seal
• Cable to Branching Unit(BU)

Since fibre optic technology was introduced in the late 1970s, over 80 worldwide manufacturer connector styles have been developed.  Each new design was meant to offer better performance (less light loss and back reflection), install ease and lower cost.

So what causes splice loss?

Referring to the figure below, loss mechanisms relate to geometry factors which cause misalignment of the fibres, gaps, concentricity errors between the fibre centrelines, end angle errors and axial misalignment, for example.  Optical factors also play a large part in splice losses, one being the mode field diameters of the two fibres being spliced, or otherwise known as the numerical aperture of the two fibres.  Numerical aperture (NA) is a measurement of the size in microns typically of the acceptance angle of the fibre or the single mode power distribution of the light being carried down the fibre.  The closer the NA's match the better the power transfer between the two fibres.  Loss is minimized when the two fibre cores are aligned perfectly (which modern fusion splicers are very good at). Only the light that is coupled into the receiving fibre core will propagate, so all the rest of the light becomes the connector or splice loss.

 The end finish of the fibre must be properly polished to minimize loss.  A rough surface will scatter light and dirt can scatter and absorb light.  Since the optical fibre is so small, typical airborne dirt can be a major source of loss.  Cleanliness is critical during all splicing operations.

Our illustrious Infrastructure Manager and Engineering Manager returned this week from their visit to Shinagawa, Tokyo, where they met with TATA.  

Below is a tale of their adventure of travelling to the meeting in Toyohashi.

"It is Friday morning rush hour in Tokyo's Shinagawa. We are overcome with fulfillment and excitement as we are about to embark on a 1.5 hour journey on the 'Shinkansen Bullet Train' (pictured).

The concept of a train which moves at a speed of up to 250kmph, which arrives and leaves within 40 seconds of its scheduled departure time, otherwise it's considered late, is unbelievable and truly amazing and not dissimilar as cave man discovering fire.

Little did I appreciate that as a consequence of his boyhood dreams being realised, I was about to presented with a classic situation of "stunned like schoolboy foolishness" developing within my colleague. Like the early cave man, we were both about to get burnt!

When we entered the Shinagawa station we were taken aback from the strange orderly chaos of tens of thousands of commuters going about their daily journey to their place of employment. In many cities it's a dog eat dog world when traversing a station concourse. Here in Tokyo, it's the world of a marching army of people and in comparison, silence prevails.

We were both standing on the platform approximately 10 minutes before our departure time, in our designated location (no random queues allowed here). The sound of the platform air raid like siren began to wail signifying the silent arrival of the somewhat stealthy bullet train. Camera's are out! Both of us are snapping away. As soon as the train halts and the doors open we downed our tourist tools, picked up our bags and boarded the train.

I take the lead through the cabin to find our reserved seats. In doing so, we discover the seats are occupied. The train is now pulling off and we are getting up to speed. We try to work out how we are going to tell the occupiers of our seats to shift or alternatively explain to the ticket inspector we are happy to sit elsewhere. Either way it's going to be grief and involve a lot of pointing & shoulder shrugging.

Alarm bells are ringing in our heads. Something is not right. The culture here is attention to detail and respect. There is no way our seats should be occupied. The penny begins to drop, we are doing 150kmph+, and there is no getting off the train, and its two minutes before our departure time. Dazzled with the shock and awe of the bullet, my mate has walked onto the wrong train and I too have been hustled into doing the same. ARRRRRH!

So now we realise our bigger problem.  There is a TATA representative due to meet us in Toyohashi (some 300km away), we are on the wrong train with no idea where we are going and in the belief we will have traveled 100km+ before we can disembark the train. It's too early to beer it up, so we are going to have to deal with the situation in a professional manner.

Suddenly, the train begins to slow, a Japanese announcement is made and we hope we are presented with the opportunity of getting off the Bullet. Matt now realising things couldn't get any worse, and me blaming him for the mess we are in, finally clues into the fact. We agree to gamble with the idea of pointing & shoulder shrugging on the forthcoming station platform in the hope we didn't get busted for non compliant tickets.

We bail out of the train with our bags, the immediate affect of the humidity becoming apparent immediately. And yes we had our cameras out again! Soaking wet, we began to figure out our location and by fortune it turned out we had got on a train which shared a common starting route with our intended train. All we had to do was wait on the platform for 2 minutes.

The rest is Pipe History....."

Back in June, construction began on our new cable landing facility in Madang. An expansion of an existing building, the works are expected to be completed by the end of August this year.

The Madang Cable Landing Station Outside Plant (OSP) survey was completed in the week 8^th - 12^th July.  The outcome of the OSP survey schedule will be developed along with the Guam and Sydney survey reports.

PIPE's Environmental Plan, Madang's local planning and construction laws are all being observed during assembly of the structure.  PIPE and its partners will closely monitor the works for compliance as well as any environmental impacts.

Madang CLS is expected to be operational by April/May 2009 functioning as a landing point for the PPC-1 cable.

Updating our blog entry on the 18^th April 2008, PPC-1 will incorporate up to six types of cable to make the distance from Australia to Guam. 

When PPC-1 rolls off the cable ships and onto the seabed in early 2009, over 6500 kilometres of cable would have been manufactured at the Hitachi Minato Works to make the project possible.  Each of the SL17 cable categories may be used in several areas of the route.

PIPE's cable is 17mm in diameter, hence the name SL17.  The cables are designed to protect the fibres from pressure and external forces.  The optical fibres are supported in the core unit fibre structure (UFS) to prevent the fibres buckling due to the thermal contraction and bending of the cable.  The design is commonly used for repeater system construction, and is confidently laid in the varied terrains ranging from lightly protected deep water cable to rock armoured for shallow waters resistant to crushing and extreme abrasion.

The outcome of the survey will decide the cable types to be used in each terrain along the route.

On their recent trip to Japan, the PIPE International team attended a site visit at the Hitachi Minato Works facility.  The plant is responsible for the manufacture of the PPC-1 submarine cable, anticipated for rollout in early 2009. 

So far, Hitachi have manufactured 2,877 kilometres of SL17 LW (lightweight) cable and 762 kilometres of SL17 SPA cable.

Construction commenced on the the Hitachi Minato Works facility in December 1988 and it was commissioned in June 1999.  Hitachi Cable's Minato Works, located in Hitachi Port, Ibaraki Prefecture, specialises in fibre optic cable products.

Minato Works has a private berth that can accommodate 30,000 ton class cable layer ships just beside the factory. This enables long and heavy submarine cables to be fed directly into a vessel's hold.

We have completed the first fibre cable installation via the initial core holes shown above, which are located underneath the footway running along the side of the Landing Station facility. The cable runs to the proposed rack location within previously installed flexible steel conduit called anaconda ducting.   

Once electrical works finish within the area, the diverse cable will pass through the core holes located at the front of the building, and into the anaconda ducting.

Entering the final stages of construction, the CLS cable tray has been fastened to the wall, aligned with the lead-in holes for the power cables.  The cable will exit through the holes and connect to the sub stations on the kerbside. 

The fibre cables have been run from the street kerb in preparation for threading through the holes and onto the trays.  This begins in the coming weeks.  

The tray system (pictured below) is a rigid structure used to securely fasten and support the cables.  A technique called cable spreading is utilised for the separation of the power and data utilities.  The fibre cables will run on the top tray whilst the power cables will run on the bottom tray (pictured).  

So far, some 10.6 kilometres of electrical cable has been used inside the facility.  And, over 600 metres of cable tray requiring over 880 metres of unistruts has also been used. 

A new addition to the CLS...

The perforated roll-a-door, which pulls inward airflow for the generators, has been installed.  Outgoing airflow will be directed into the ventilation shaft using silver cowling, stretching from the generators to the wall.