Fibre tools and meters

Buying guide

Fibre can't be joined by hand: a fusion splicer melts the two ends together with an electric arc and measures the loss on the spot. A good splice starts with a precise cut, so the cleaver matters just as much as the splicer. An OTDR (reflectometer) shows how far along the line a fault is, while a power meter tells you how much signal reaches the far end. A visual fault locator uses red light to find a break on a short line.