FieldCast SMPTE PUW-FUW 50m Hybrid Fiber Cable

Most of what a short SMPTE line costs sits in its two terminations rather than in the metres between them, which is why FieldCast supplies this family as a close-spaced ladder of factory lengths. The FieldCast SMPTE PUW-FUW 50m Hybrid Fiber Cable sits at the top of that ladder: the longest length still delivered as a coil, before the range moves onto drums. Its two ends are deliberately unalike — a Lemo FUW straight plug at one, a PUW free socket at the other — so two assemblies chain tail to head when a position sits further out than the site visit suggested.

The cable itself is Furukawa TV-OM-AMS, the A-grade member of that maker's SMPTE 311M range. Two single mode 9/125 cores travel beside six tinned copper conductors, four carrying camera power and two reserved for control, around a central galvanised steel strength member, under a braided copper screen covering 85 % of the core. Load goes into the steel rather than into the glass, so one person can drag a coil across a stage floor; tension is rated to 700 N and the sheath works from −20 °C to +80 °C.

Paired with Blackmagic's Camera and Studio Fiber Converters, a single line carries a 12G-SDI camera output up to 2160p60, three independent HD return feeds, two-channel talkback, tally, genlock, camera control and the head's own power, over a link those converters rate to two kilometres. Fifty metres spends a fraction of that budget. A pit-wall camera reaching the truck in a motorsport paddock, a fly-gallery position dropping to a rack below the stage, a demo stage tied back to a control bay behind an exhibition stand — at this scale the optical margin is never in doubt and only mechanical behaviour decides.

The Lemo PUW-FUW connectors follow the stainless 3K.93C pattern to SMPTE 304, push-pull latched, sealed to IP68 and verified at 1.8 m for 48 hours, with 20 000 mating cycles behind them and moulded gaiters at both cable entries. Power contacts handle 10 A at up to 600 V rms and the signal contacts 3 A, so nothing at the connector limits the converter pair. Wind it no tighter than 55 mm of radius, keep the caps fitted between jobs, and fifty metres stores in a bag or flight case, on a shelf no drum would fit.