Patent ID: 7527435

Claim:
A right-angle optical-fiber connector assembly, comprising: a rigid ferrule having at least one right-angle bend and defining a ferrule interior and first and second ferrule ends; a plurality of bend-performance optical fibers that traverse the ferrule interior and that have respective first and second optical fiber ends, a bending radius R F and a minimum bending radius R MIN wherein R MIN ≦R F ≦R MAX , wherein R MAX is the maximum fiber bending radius allowed by the ferrule interior, and wherein at least one of the optical fibers has R F =R MIN , and wherein at least one of the optical fibers is an outermost fiber having a bending radius R F greater than R MIN ;and first and second connector ends respectively located at or near the first and second ferrule ends and that respectively operably support the first and second optical fiber ends to provide external optical interconnection capability, wherein the rigid ferrule is an overmold formed by providing flowable material about the optical fibers.