CrossxD - 29-4-2017 at 11:03
Hello,
can I use dioxane or dimethyl ether for Grignards reactions?
PirateDocBrown - 29-4-2017 at 11:28
At what temperature do you propose to work with dimethyl ether?
DraconicAcid - 29-4-2017 at 12:25
Dioxane will actually react with Grignard reagents to precipitate a magnesium halide solvate, leaving a dialkylmagnesium species in solution. This
will generally react the same as a Grignard, though.
clearly_not_atara - 29-4-2017 at 13:32
It reacts similar to a Grignard but somewhat faster and the solution is pyrophoric. Not usually what you want.
Diethoxymethane is the only solvent for Grignards that isn't a simple aliphatic monoether afaik. It can be distilled as the azeotrope with ethanol
from a rxn mixture of ethanol and formaldehyde with acid catalyst. It can then be purified by removing the lower-boiling ethanol as its azeotrope with
ethyl acetate.
[Edited on 29-4-2017 by clearly_not_atara]
AvBaeyer - 29-4-2017 at 19:53
Tetrahydrofuran is a common solvent though sometimes reactions are sluggish. Dimethoxymethane and dibutylether have also been suggested as solvents in
some of the older literature. I have never tried either one of these latter two.
AvB