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Organic chemistry

hey,

quick question:

what do the cracking and reforming of alkanes produce?

thanks
Let's hear what you think first of all. Clue is in the name.
Reply 2
Avatar for striver17
striver17
OP
i think it's when alkanes are turned into alkanes/hydrocarbons. i'm not sure what the difference is between cracking and reforming though.
Reply 3
Avatar for JackG1
JackG1
6
Pretty sure it's branched alkanes and cycloalkanes.
Original post by JackG1
Pretty sure it's branched alkanes and cycloalkanes.


That's specifically for catalytic cracking.

Thermal cracking gives mixtures of products containing high proportions of hydrocarbons with double bonds - alkenes.
Reply 5
Avatar for xsmithyz
xsmithyz
Reforming is taking an alkane and turning it into a ring type structure. E.g a benzene molecule.
Cracking is used to turn long chain hydrocarbons into more useful short chain HC's by breaking the chain. As a consequence of this, unsaturation is introduced, hence Alkene products formed.
Process is driven by a favorable change in entropy, hence the higher temperatures used.
Reply 7
Avatar for tamimi
tamimi
16
Cracking is exactly what it says.

Reforming is for example when you take a chain and give it a circle ish structure (I.e. aromatic ring or something of the sort). Do stuff to it to give it a higher octane number bro.

In context of AS Chemistry, techniques like these are used to improve the usability of the fuel, for example, increasing the octane number, increasing volatility, decreasing activation energy. Thing like that.
(edited 12 years ago)
Reply 8
Avatar for striver17
striver17
OP
ohh i get it!!! thanks guys!

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