CO2 laser polishing of conical shaped optical fiber deflectors

A novel method for polishing conical shaped optical fiber deflectors by modulated - CO2 laser exposure is reported. The conical shaped fiber deflector geometry was first formed with rough mechanical polishing, then it was exposed to modulated - CO2 laser operating with wavelength at 10.6 mu m to achieve fine polish surfaces. The motivation of this work is to demonstrate that the modulated - CO2 laser exposure approach allows a fiber surface roughness at a nanometer scale without modifying the conical shape of the fiber deflector. The average surface roughness of mechanically polished fiber deflectors with 30 and 9 mu m lapping films was smoothed down to 20.4 and 4.07 nm, respectively, after - CO2 laser polishing process. By combining mechanical and laser polishing techniques, fabrication of conical shaped optical fiber deflectors takes less time and it becomes laborer independent and easy to apply.