Factory Spliced Cable Assembly

Abstract

A telecommunications cable including a main cable having a central buffer tube enclosed within a cable jacket and a ribbon stack positioned within the buffer tube. The main cable includes a cut region where a slot has been cut through the cable jacket and the buffer tube to provide access to the ribbon stack during manufacture of the telecommunication cable. A tether branches from the main cable at the cut region. The tether includes an optical fiber that is optically coupled to an optical fiber of the ribbon stack.

1 . A telecommunications cable comprising:
 a main cable including a cable jacket and a central buffer tube positioned within the cable jacket, the central buffer tube defining a buffer tube passage, the main cable also including a ribbon stack positioned within the buffer tube passage, the ribbon stack including a width, a height and a maximum cross-dimension, the buffer tube passage having a minimum cross-dimension, the main cable including a cut region where a slot has been cut through the cable jacket and the buffer tube to provide access to the ribbon stack during manufacture of the telecommunication cable, the slot having a length and a width, the width of the slot being larger than the width of the ribbon stack, and the minimum cross-dimension of the buffer tube passage being larger than the maximum cross-dimension of the ribbon stack;   a tether that branches from the main cable at the cut region;   an optical fiber structure that extends from the ribbon stack, through the cut region and into the tether; and   an enclosure covering the cut region.