I have a reference on two different reactions from the same article
The Reduction of Cupric Chloride by Carbonyl Compounds, Kochi, Jay K. (1955), JACS vol 77. pgs 5274-5278.
The first is 150ml Acetone, 50ml Water, 12g CuCl2, 6g LiCl with a yield of about 2g (60%).
The second is 5g CuCl2, 4ml Water, 1L Acetone with a yield not given.
Another reaction mentioned is 3g CuCl, 2.98g LiCl, and 45ml anhydrous acetone, which absorbes oxygen from the air and forms 2CuO-2CuCl2 complex. This reaction has a half life of 25 minutes. Somewhere or other (rhodium or here) this is incorrectly stated as being the chlorination reaction.
I am looking for ways to carry out this reaction without huge excesses of Acetone without compromising yield too badly.
My current theory is that a two layer reaction might be possible. With one layer being water saturated with CuCl2 and LiCl and the second layer being acetone. Since adding excess salts to the mix causes these two to separate this seems feasible. And since chloroacetone will prefer the acetone layer and be lighter than the salt saturated layer it will be removed from the primary reaction zone. By very slowly bubbling oxygen through the mixture it should be possible to cause the reacted copper salt complex to precipitate where it should react with the HCl present to regenerate CuCl2. Since the original reactions were done at a reflux temperature this should probably be done just below refluxing to avoid emulsifying the two layers. If the CuO won't react under these condition then it could still be separated and reacted with boiling HCL and added back to the reaction mixture.
I am not sure if this would work but it certainly seems like an avenue to explore. The primary drawback would be if the dichloro compounds were formed in much larger quantities, which is the root of my question about the stearic hinderance. This does nothing to solve the problem with the heavy molar weight of CuCl2 but it may reduce the number of moles needed below 2 as well as the quantity of acetone needed.
I also agree that this thread should probably be moved to general chemistry if one of the moderators would be so kind.
FC