The determination of aldehydes in the exhaust gases of LPG fuelled engines

The exhaust gas of a LPG fuelled engine is drawn through two bubblers in series in an ice bath, and filled with saturated 2,4-dinitrophenylhydrazine in 2M HCl. After heating the derivatives are extracted with toluene-cyclohexane and 1l samples injected on-column on a OV1 capillary column. Using an FID the lower limit of detection is 15–18 pg for formaldehyde (about 8–10 ppbv for a 16l exhaust sample). Taking the blank into account, the limit is about 40 ppbv. The exhaust gases of a LPG-fuelled engine contain formaldehyde, acetaldehyde, propionaldehyde, acrolein and acetone. Carbonyl compounds of more than 3 C-atoms were not found in detectable amounts. The engine was rund under stoichiometric, lean and rich air/fuel conditions. Under rich conditions the concentrations of the aldehydes were: formaldehyde 2.8 ppm, acetaldehyde 1.3 ppm, propionaldehyde 0.06 ppm, acrolein 0.03 ppm, acetone 0.17 ppm; under stoichiometric conditions: 4.5, 1.6, 0.10, 0.03 and 0.18 ppm respectively; under lean conditions 17.0, 2.9, 0.13, 0.07 and 0.27 ppm respectively. These figures demonstrate the necessity of measuring aldehydes in exhaust gases of LPG-fuelled engines

A CP-MAS NMR study of some deactivation methods in capillary gas chromatography

The effect of temperature, water content, and the type of reagent on the silylation of fused silica capillaries was studied by 29Si and 13C CP-MAS NMR. Fumed silica (Cab-O-Sil M5), which is essentially a highly dispersed vitreous quartz with a surface comparable to that of fused silica capillary columns, was selected as a model material. Hexamethyldisilazane (HMDS) and 1,2-diphenyl-1,1,3,3-tetraphenyldisilazane (DPTMDS), which were used as silylation reagents, yielded trimethyl- and dimethylphenylsilyl surface groups respectively at lower temperatures (<350°C an