[Limpet Chicken]

Hey all.

I read something a while ago, apparently pinacolyl alcohol is available from certain farm products, sheep dip or parasiticide type stuff as far as I can remember, I tried searching for pinacolyl alcohol via google, and all I get is crap relating to its use in synthesizing soman, and the nephrotoxicity of the compound itself, does anyone know more on this?

A synthesis would be nice, but I can't seem to find any patents or anything, which is a rooyal pain in the general rectal vicinity, because I am planning a few experiments with substitutions of alkyl groups to organic molecules (that are STRICTLY phosphorus/and/or/fluorine free!)

Could anyone throw some light on the synthesis of this annoying alcohol?
Thanks.

[movies]

This is going to be a tough molecule to synthesize with everyday materials.  It's not easy to make a quaternary carbon.

Have you looked for pinacolone?  That stuff appears to be dirt cheap from chemical suppliers.  You'd just be a reduction away....

[Limpet Chicken]

There is a reason that I don't want to just buy anything related to pinacolyl alcohol, I myself want it for some pretty random experiments with mercaptans and selenols, problem is, pinacolyl alcohol's only use that I can think of is in the synthesis of the nerve agents soman and chlorosoman, which makes ordering anything like that suspicious as hell