Chemical Properties
dark grey-violet crystalline powder
Uses
It is a precursor for many tungsten compounds. It is used in tungsten plating, purification of tungsten, and olefin polymerization. It is also used as petroleum catalyst, and in intelligent glass. It can be used for deoxygenation of epoxides and as a reagent in organic synthesis.
Uses
A precursor to tungsten based carbenes.
Uses
Precursor to tungsten-based carbenes which catalyze the olefin metathesis reactions of 1- and 2-octene.
Definition
ChEBI: Tungsten hexachloride is a tungsten coordination entity.
Flammability and Explosibility
Not classified
Purification Methods
Sublime it in a stream of Cl2 in a high temperature furnace and collect it in a receiver cooled in a Dry Ice-acetone bath in an inert atmosphere because it is sensitive to moisture. It is soluble in CS2, CCl4, CHCl3, POCl3, *C6H6, pet ether and Me2CO. Its solutions decompose on standing. Good crystals can be obtained by heating WCl6 in CCl4 to 100o in a sealed tube, followed by slow cooling (tablets of four-sided prisms). Store it in a desiccator over H2SO4 in the dark. [Leitzke & Holt Inorg Synth III 163 1950, Parterfield & Tyree Inorg Synth IX 133 1967, Hein & Herzog in Handbook of Preparative Inorganic Chemistry (Ed. Brauer) Academic Press Vol II p 1420 1965.]
