Hockeydemon
Hazard to Others
Posts: 218
Registered: 25-2-2013
Member Is Offline
Mood: No Mood
|
|
1-butanol dehydrogenation via heated copper
I was hoping to dehydrogenate 1-butanol by heating up a coil of copper wire that I have laying around, and suspending it above a beaker of 1-butanol.
I figured this was fairly easy, and straight forward because of this lab
However when I performed it small scale not much took place. Upon further reading it appears that this process is usually done in a tube furnace with
a inert carrier gas.
Is this an impractical method without having a way to vaporize the alcohol with an inert gas to prevent ignition?
|
|
|
Magpie
lab constructor
Posts: 5939
Registered: 1-11-2003
Location: USA
Member Is Offline
Mood: Chemistry: the subtle science.
|
|
Here's some interesting reading on attempts to make acetaldehyde:
http://www.sciencemadness.org/talk/viewthread.php?tid=55&...
I suspect making butraldehyde isn't all that easy either.
The single most important condition for a successful synthesis is good mixing - Nicodem
|
|
|
kch
Harmless
Posts: 26
Registered: 7-7-2013
Member Is Offline
Mood: No Mood
|
|
Depending on how badly you need it, you could try this:
-Oxidize primary alcohol to butanoic acid using KMnO4 or Jones'
-Reflux with SOCl2 to butanoyl chloride
-Reduce with NaBH4 over dry ice to give the aldehyde
It's not really economical, but I think it's possible for the amateur to perform
|
|
|
Metacelsus
International Hazard
Posts: 2539
Registered: 26-12-2012
Location: Boston, MA
Member Is Offline
Mood: Double, double, toil and trouble
|
|
Thionyl chloride, sodium borohydride and dry ice  ? Just use pyridinium
chlorochromate!
It would probably be cheapest to just buy the butyraldehyde.
Also, you could condense acetaldehyde (good luck getting that!) to form crotonaldehyde and hydrogenate it.
http://www.organic-chemistry.org/chemicals/oxidations/pyridi...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crotonaldehyde
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butyraldehyde
[Edit] Added sources
[Edited on 5-8-2013 by Cheddite Cheese]
|
|
|
kch
Harmless
Posts: 26
Registered: 7-7-2013
Member Is Offline
Mood: No Mood
|
|
I'm learning here, bear with me 
<!-- bfesser_edit_tag -->[<a href="u2u.php?action=send&username=bfesser">bfesser</a>: removed
quote of entire preceding post]
[Edited on 6.8.13 by bfesser]
|
|
|
![[*]](images/xpblue/default_icon.gif){kind=icon}
