Hydrogen fluoride vibrational energy distributions for the reactions of fluorine atoms with cyclanes

The hydrogen fluoride infrared chemiluminescence produced by the reactions of fluorine atoms with cyclopropane, cyclopentane, and cyclohexane have been studied. The emission data were used to determine the vibrational energy distributions for the abstraction of hydrogen from the secondary carbon–hydrogen bonds of these small cyclic hydrocarbons. The fraction of reaction exothermicity going into vibrational excitation of hydrogen fluoride was as follows: c-C₃H₆, 45%; c-C₅H₁₀, 53%; c-C₆H₁₂, 49%. The slightly lower fraction for the cyclopropane system may indicate that its radical reorganization energy is not completely available for excitation of product HF.