Synthesis and Characterization of Tetraethylorthosilicate Catalised by CuO/SiO2 Catalyst

Abstract

Tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) was synthesized by chemical methods from silicon dioxide and diethyl ether using acid catalyst of hydrochloric acid (11.8M) by two methods, direct method and by using copper oxide supported on silica catalyst. The sol gel process was applied for the preparation of nano silica gel. This method involves hydrolysis and condensation reaction of TEOS, the mechanism of this method was explained and show formation of a network Si-O-Si chemical linkage form the alkoxysilane, the yield of tetraethylorthosilicate was characterized by Fourier transform-Infrared (FT-IR) spectroscopy, the results indicating that, the bond of Si-OSi successfully formed. Finally the comparison between two methods was studied and results show that, the rate of reaction of TEOS which prepared by direct method was equal to l0.008g/sec and that which prepared by using catalyst was equal to 0.27g/sec, this indicating that, the tetraethylorthosilicate which prepared using catalyst was better than that prepared by direct method.