Heraeus offers services to convert your core rods into a full preform. Please read below more about the very flexible outside deposition process for individual solutions.
Cladding service to produce specialty fiber preforms
Plasma Outside Deposition (POD)
If your core rod requires cladding with a refractive index lower than that of pure fused silica, this process might be the solution for you.
This process yields highly fluorine-doped layers of glass on the substrate material, both solid and tubular. A special advantage of the process is that it is possible to clad non-circular substrates, e.g. square, hexagonal or D-shaped cores. In this case, the resulting cladding will have a non-uniform thickness.
Additionally, the fluorine content and with it the refractive index of each layer can be adjusted. This allows the production of complex refractive index profiles.
This process is very flexible and the outcome depends on many variables. It is well suited for prototyping and small scale production. The numerical aperture can be up to 0.3, depending on the size and shape of the starting material. For additional information please see our data sheet and we invite you to contact our experts with questions and your specific cladding task.