Flexible cables, or 'continuous-flex' cables, are electrical cables specially designed to cope with the tight bending radii and physical stress associated with moving applications, such as inside cable carriers.
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Due to increasing demands within the field of automation technology in the 1980s, such as increasing loads, moving cables guided inside cable carriers often failed, although the cable carriers themselves did not. In extreme cases, failures caused by "corkscrews" and core ruptures brought entire production lines to a standstill, at high cost. As a result, specialized, highly flexible cables were developed with unique characteristics to differentiate them from standard designs. These are sometimes called “chain-suitable,” “high-flex,” or “continuous flex” cables.
A higher level of flexibility means the service life of a cable inside a cable carrier can be greatly extended. A normal cable typically manages 50,000 cycles, but a dynamic cable can complete between one and three million cycles.
Here the cable conductors are braidedConstruction
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Flexible cables can be divided into two types: those with conductors stranded in layers inside the cable, and those that have bundled or braided conductors.
Stranding in layers
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Stranding in layers is easier to produce, and therefore usually less expensive. The cable cores are stranded firmly and left relatively long in several layers around the center and are then enclosed in an extruded tube shaped jacket. In the case of shielded cables, the cores are wrapped up with fleece or foils.
However, this type of construction means that, during the bending process, the inner radius compresses and the outer radius stretches as the cable core moves. Initially, this works quite well, because the elasticity of the material is still sufficient, but material fatigue can set in and cause permanent deformations. The cores move and begin to make their own compressing and stretching zones, which can lead to a “corkscrew” shape, and ultimately, core rupture.
Stranding in bundles
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The unique cable construction technique of braiding conductors around a tension-proof centre instead of layering them is the second type of construction.
Eliminating multi-layers guarantees a uniform bend radius across each conductor. At any point where the cable flexes, the path of any core moves quickly from the inside to the outside of the cable. The result is that no single core compresses near the inside of the bend or stretches near the outside of the bend—which reduces overall stresses. An outer jacket is still required to prevent the cores untwisting. A pressure filled jacket, rather than a simple extruded jacket, is preferable here. This fills all the gussets around the cores and ensures that the cores cannot untwist. The resulting dynamic cable is often stiffer than a standard cable, but lasts longer in applications where it must constantly flex.
Use within cable carriers/drag chains
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With a number of different applications, flexible cables are a versatile material to work with. When used within construction flexible cables often need to be protected using cable carriers/drag chains. This is no only for the health and safety of workers but also the protection of the cable itself. If a cable were to get damaged, it is likely that the damage will be costly to repair. Similarly, if cables are left to hang mid-air or run along the floor there is a heightened risk of injury.
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Solid or flexible power cable?
The use of flexible cable arises when there is a specific need:
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These cables are better resistant to manipulation, as they are provided with multi-strand copper wire and are suitable in case of repeated bending;
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If there are difficulties for installation in the pipes with rigid cables.
While the solid ethernet cables contain solid conductors, connection cables are made with flexible conductors (copper strand). The flexibility allows them to withstand the abuse of manipulations such as reconnection that involve frequent bending.
The LANF series refers precisely to this type of cable.
The pre-assembled patch cords, factory tested, are the advisable choice to provide the connection between the horizontal wiring terminals and network connectivity devices such as switches and concentrators (hub) through patch panels; furthermore, they provide the connections between the sockets, usually on the wall and network devices, such as: computers, printers and other service Ethernet devices.
They are the part of the network cabling that can actually be seen and manipulated. Because of their exposed position the connection cables of the patch cords connected are almost always the weakest link in the system. Bends, rips, tears, crushing and poor or worn contacts are the hidden dangers of the field of application and can dramatically reduce the performance of a patch cord.
Although it is possible to build the connection cord with the same backbone cables, we strongly advise against this practice and suggest to use dedicated patch cords industrially manufactured for this purpose and of the same transmission category of backbone cables.
In case you wish to or it is necessary to create a "patch" with backbone cables or cables suitable for use over long distances, it is necessary to choose the appropriate pin for the cable terminal taking care to check the diameters in mm or AWG, both of the internal conductor and of the insulation, to ensure compatibility between cable and connector.
The construction of the patch cables requires great precision to ensure the necessary and constant transmission performance, as well as the manufacture of the RJ45 plugs and the precise parallel alignment of the contact blades which constitute a capacitive platform, which otherwise would be a signals coupling source or crosstalk.
Furthermore, the untwisting and separation of pairs as a result of the termination process increases the susceptibility of the cable against interference. In addition to this, the mechanical bending process that secures the connector to the cable could potentially disturb the normal geometry of the cable crushing the cable pairs and this is another source of crosstalk interference and an additional source of attenuation. From all this it follows that the links produced and tested in the factory are the components needed to achieve consistent and reliable transmission performance.
We also suggest to always keep into account the minimum bend radius and maximum traction power recommendations while preparing a loose grouping of cords bundle with clamps, so that they can freely rotate when the panels are repositioned, while the cables tangling must always be avoided.
The offer of flexible CAVEL Ethernet cables, LANF series has these characteristics as limits:
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Minimum bending radius 20/40 (cat. 5e);
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Cable minimum thickness 5 mm (cat. 5e);
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Bandwidth capacity depending on the category from 100 to 600 MHz.
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