Swig was really excited about using toluene and KMnO4 to make benzoic acid, then taking that and making the ester, then use ethanol and sodium to benzyl alcohol, then react with a halogen, Grignard reagent with CH3C---N to make P2P, but nobody seems to think this method is easy. Swig did however find some benzyl alcohol for $35.00.-1 gallon So that just eliminates a bunch of steps, Swig still might just do it from scratch for the learning process. What Swig is curious about is why many of you guys do not talk about this method. P4O10 is easily gotten and that can dehydrated acetamide to from the nitrile. Swig has never preformed grignard reaction, but he is up for the challenge. So if one has his nitrile and then one just used an acid to turn the alcohol into a halogen compound and pour it over Mg in ether, and then pour your nitrile, that's it. What bad side of the rxn am I missing?
P.S. The only thing that I can think is turning the benzyl alcohol into the halogen. I belive that HBr or HCl can be used.