Kinetics of acid-catalyzed hydrolysis of fluorinated propanoates

Rates of hydrolysis, kH+, of methyl 2-chloro-2,3,3,3-tetrafluoro-(III), 2,3-dichloro-2,3,3-trifluoro-(IV), 2,2,3-trichloro-3,3-difluoro-(V), 2,3,3,3-tetrafluoro-(VI) and 3-chloro-2,3,3-trifluoropropanoate (VII) were measured in 0.5M-HCl in aqueous methanol (80% vol; 76% wt) at 40, 50 and 60 °C. The relative rate constants, krel (50 °C), (for the propanoate III, kH+ = 4.3 . 10-5 l mol-1 s-1; krel = 100) are 311, 100, 38, 9.4, 44 and 15 for the esters II, III, IV, V, VI and VII, respectively (experimental error ±9%). It was found that krel = αβ where α and β are the following factors for groups in the position 2 and 3: CClF 10, CHF 4.2, CCl2 2.8, CF3 10 and CClF2 3.6. The rate constants obey the isokinetic relationship. For the ester III the dependence of log kobs on logarithm of hydrogen chloride concentration is linear at concentrations 0.08-2.4 mol l-1 which, together with high activation entropy ΔS≠ for the esters III-VII (-167 to -217 J mol-1 K-1), shows that the hydrolysis proceeds by an AAC2 mechanism.