Measurement of mechanical deformation of dielectric fibres by a light scattering method

Abstract

This paper describes an experimental method to detect quantitative changes of both refractive index and diameter of unclad dielectric fibres, such as fused silica fibre and nylon 6 fibre, due to tensile stress. The technique employed here is based on the variation in the position of a fringe in back-scattered light, which is generated when a laser beam is incident at a right angle to the axis of the fibre. This procedure makes it possible to measure refractive index, diameter and ellipticity to within an accuracy of 0.048%, 2.6% and 0.05%, respectively.