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Author: Subject: Aluminum Isopropoxide without nasties
Deo
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[*] posted on 3-12-2024 at 15:45
Aluminum Isopropoxide without nasties


First post in this community :)

I just successfully made aluminum isopropoxide without using mercuric chloride or iodine. I'm not sure if this is common knowledge yet but it seems like it is possible to use just Anh. Copper (II) chloride as a catalyst. I'm sure other transition metals like iron could work as well.

The setup I used was a little more complicated, where instead of just a drying tube on top of the reflux condenser, it was connected to a gas wash bottle filled with H2SO4 instead to keep all air and moisture out of the system.

I refluxed about 80 mL of IPA with 30g of aluminum foil with 2.5g of copper chloride dissolved in the IPA. At first nothing seemed to happen but after an hour the alcohol started to become dark and cloudy. After another 2 hours all the aluminum foil pieces disintegrated and the liquid was dark. At this point I stopped because it was dark, but I think it could have gone for longer.

After cooling, there was a good sign because the liquid became a gel like consistency. I burned a little bit on a metal rod and it emitted a white aluminum oxide smoke.

Anyways I still gotta vacuum distill this once my vacuum pump arrives. :)

This is the flask a couple days later.

IMG_0072.jpg - 56kB IMG_0073.jpg - 87kB

[Edited on 3-12-2024 by Deo]
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Rainwater
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[*] posted on 3-12-2024 at 16:17


House hold aluminum foil tends to leave a carbon residue whenever I disolive it.
That may be why yours has turned dark as well




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Sir_Gawain
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[*] posted on 3-12-2024 at 16:23


Good prep.

The dark residue could also be silicon.




“Alchemy is trying to turn things yellow; chemistry is trying to avoid things turning yellow.” -Tom deP.
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Deo
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[*] posted on 3-12-2024 at 16:44


I mean every other prep I’ve seen with HgCl2 also becomes dark. I’m pretty sure it’s just unreacted aluminum particles or other junk. It’s not really a problem.
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[*] posted on 3-12-2024 at 18:14


Have you tried using an aluminum-galllium alloy? That could work very well too and is not toxic.
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[*] posted on 3-12-2024 at 18:47


The reason I was testing copper chloride was that gallium is still very expensive and hard to get. If copper chloride works I see no reason to use gallium. Perhaps there is a yield improvement however I cannot test that since I am still waiting on vacuum distillation of the product.
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[*] posted on 4-12-2024 at 04:35


Nice work. I always wondered if you could use copper for this instead of mercury so it's nice to see someone confirming it.



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[*] posted on 4-12-2024 at 07:18


Quote: Originally posted by Deo  
The reason I was testing copper chloride was that gallium is still very expensive and hard to get. If copper chloride works I see no reason to use gallium. Perhaps there is a yield improvement however I cannot test that since I am still waiting on vacuum distillation of the product.


The use of CuCl2 is a very good and interesting idea, I mentioned Gallium for comparison, if a comparative experiment was done to see if the purity of the product and yield would show a difference. Yes, Gallium is expensive compared to CuCl2, but years ago I got it very cheaply from China and verified on an X-ray spectrometer its purity, which was indeed 99.99%.I am curious about your results and will try the experiment myself with Gallium and CuCl2. And welcome to the Forum!;)
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[*] posted on 4-12-2024 at 16:09


Other than getting some really pure aluminum compounds, whats this stuff good for? I read the wiki page but that doesn't really mean much to me. Other than making alcohols. Using a beer can to fill a beer can. That sounds better than plastic bottles into grape soda.
Ok scrap that. Say i wanted to make some ethanol, how would his compound do that?




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[*] posted on 4-12-2024 at 16:27


Quote: Originally posted by Rainwater  
Other than getting some really pure aluminum compounds, whats this stuff good for? I read the wiki page but that doesn't really mean much to me. Other than making alcohols. Using a beer can to fill a beer can. That sounds better than plastic bottles into grape soda.
Ok scrap that. Say i wanted to make some ethanol, how would his compound do that?



It’s useful as a reducing agent for ketones to those who can’t get borohydrides very easily. My personal usage for this is to reduce camphor to Borneol for use as a catalyst in producing sodium. You wouldn’t use this for making ethanol.

Also I made a mistake in the original prep it was 12g of al foil not 30g lol

[Edited on 5-12-2024 by Deo]
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