Fiber Simplex Breakout

SKU: SPX-17509 Brand: Sparkfun

Retired Product

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This product has been retired. It is no longer available, but this page has been kept for reference.

This board is actually a pair of boards! Sparkfun wanted to design a product that gave you the bare minimum amount of support circuitry for playing with these modules from Industrial Fiber Optics. This product is for people who might not be connecting their fiber modules directly to a UART, and instead want to interface with them simply as an LED and a photodetector. Using a pair of pliers, the two sides of the Fiber Simplex Breakout can be snapped apart along the perforated line to create a one-way fiber link. Both the receiver and transmitter have four pins: VCC, Ground, Signal, and Inverted Signal. See the Hookup Guide for information about each signal.

The Industrial Fiber Optics line of emitters and detectors are by far the most economical way we've found to create a simple fiber link between two devices. The IF-E97 emitter is literally just a superbright red LED in a fancy plastic module that makes it easy to insert a piece of optical fiber and lock it in place. On the other end, the IF-D96F is a 5v TTL phototransistor in an identical enclosure. Connect the two with a piece of fiber and you have, basically, the simplest possible fiber link. Speaking of fiber, while you can certainly use glass fiber (in the proper jacket) to connect these modules together, we recommend PMMA plastic fiber! It's cheap, it's not at all fragile, and you can cut it with scissors. In our experience, it requires no polishing at all, simply cut it with scissors and jam it into the connector.

We've tested these modules at baud rates up to 1Mbps and distances up to 50 meters with no transmission errors.

Experimental Product: SparkX products are rapidly produced to bring you the most cutting edge technology as it becomes available. These products are tested but come with no guarantees. Live technical support is not available for SparkX products. Head on over to our forum for support or to ask a question.

Features

Easily create fiber serial links between embedded devices
Supports Serial Baud Rates up to 1Mbps
5V and 3.3V compatible

Documents

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Retired

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