Process and apparatus for forming a porous glass preform

摘要

A method and apparatus for rapidly forming a porous glass preform is provided in which an array of burners is oscillated along a path parallel to the longitudinal axis of the preform. Unlike existing soot deposition techniques, the oscillation amplitude is limited so that each burner deposits soot on only a portion of the preform, e.g., 20% of the preform. By controlling inter-burner variability and the air flow in the burner-array/preform region, preforms having substantially uniform axial properties are obtained notwithstanding the fact that different burners are used to laydown different parts of the preform.