Effects of Ether on the Cationic Polymerization of Isobutylene Catalyzed by AlCl(3)

[Image: see text] In this work, we prepared different initiator solutions containing ether and AlCl(3) by changing the addition sequence of ingredients, studied the interactions between ether and AlCl(3) from the evolution of the Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectra by comparison, and investigated the catalytic performances of AlCl(3) affected by ether for isobutylene polymerization. We observed that different preparation methods of initiator solutions could lead to two kinds of interactions between ether and H(2)O/AlCl(3) in hexane. The strong interaction could stabilize carbenium ions and seriously decrease the catalytic performance, whereas the weak interaction could promote isomerization and proton elimination. Moreover, we found that the preparation method of initiator solutions was not a critical factor in CH(2)Cl(2). Finally, a universal mechanism based on the AlCl(3)-involved interactions in different solvents was proposed to understand the effects of ether on the cationic polymerization catalyzed by AlCl(3) thoroughly.