Sciencemadness Discussion Board

Anhydrous Formaldehyde - Methods to Produce

ABE - 7-1-2017 at 13:54

From what I have found online and in literature 1,3,5-trioxane seems to be the only way to accomplish this (anhydrous formaldehyde). Paraformaldehyde seemed to have potential but I couldn't figure out a known method. Im sure there are other ways, and I welcome any information on simpler methods that you may know of.

Anyway from what I know 1,3,5-trioxane will require ~200C heating passed through an electron rich compound/catalyst, I read AlCl3, I remember there being a need for a phosphorus (#-oxide I presume?) at one stage in this set up, but am not sure when or even why this would be needed. Anyway in the end it should come off as a pure gas stream of heated monomeric formaldehyde. I will be running a test similar to what I explained above and run the exhaust gas through a bubbler and test the liquid for formaldehyde content to see if the process worked at all.

But any extra, more precise info on the subject or even perhaps a simpler overall method would be very helpful, thank you for the help!

-Andy

Magpie - 7-1-2017 at 14:21

http://www.sciencemadness.org/talk/viewthread.php?tid=65281#...

ABE - 7-1-2017 at 14:40

I remember reading this thread a bit ago when I was figuring things out, thanks for the link. The only problem for me is I don't have a tube furnace with precise temperature measurements....do you know where I could get one for decently cheap price Magpie??

Magpie - 7-1-2017 at 15:00

No, ebay would be my only suggestion. Or you could build one yourself. But I'm not saying it would be cheap.