chloral hydrate

[stratosphere]

i was wondering about making chloral hydrate in the following manor:

first prep and isolate ethanal by distillation off a ethnol/H20/HOCl soltn. ethanal boils at just a little over room temp.

then add the ethanal to a soltn of H20/NaOH about 3mols of NaOH/mol of ethanal.
then add to this a solutin of chlorine water with abit more then 3mols of Cl2 for every mol of ethanal.

some chloroform/formic acid would proboly be made as a byprouct, but these should be seperable by distllation.

finally the trichlroethanal would have to be hydrated, i don't know how this would best done.

[adroit_synth]

Have you checked out this synth on Rhodium's site?

https://www.thevespiary.org/rhodium/Rhodium/chemistry/chloralhydrate.html

Might help.

[stratosphere]

i did see that, but it wasn't really what i wanted, it was brand specific as opposed to chemical specific, and it really didn't give much indication of the chemistry going on.

[adroit_synth]

I was trying to convert the brand specific proportions to an exact mole ingredient and fell short without further knowledge of the products involved, and little enthusiasm to reasearch.

[Rhodium]

Ethanol + Chlorine -> Chloral

Patent US2443183

Patent US2478152

Ethanal + Chlorine -> Chloral

Patent GB644914

Patent DE874303

Chlorine gas is prepared by acidification of sodium or calcium hypochlorite or KMnO4 oxidation of HCl, see my page for details.