Optical fiber coating device having cooler

Abstract

Disclosed is an optical fiber coating device for coating the outer circumference of the optical fiber with the coating material, in which the coating device is provided with and a gas provider for providing an environmental gas within the coating device, and a cooler for cooling down the environmental gas provided to the coater from the gas provider.

What is claimed is:  
     
         1 . A method for providing a coated fiber characterized by passing a bare optical fiber through a first coating material and thereafter passing said first coated fiber through a second coating material, and wherein said first coating and said second coating are performed under pressure.  
     
     
         2 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein said pressure is adjusted to cause the kinematic viscosity of said pressure to be lowered by a prescribed level.  
     
     
         3 . A method for eliminating bubbles during an optical fiber coating process, said method comprising the steps of: 
 (a) cooling gas;    (b) providing the cooled gas to a coater while coating an optical fiber in the coater with a coating material to produce a coated optical fiber;    (c) observing the coated optical fiber to make a determination as to whether any bubbles exist in the coating material on the coated optical fiber; and    (d) responsive to a determination that bubbles exist, decreasing a temperature to which gas is cooled in step (a) when repeating step (a) in preparation for step(b).