“…Under the conditions of the experiments (i.e., rapid reaction, low temperature, and high dilution) reaction 17 can only be of importance for alcohols having great tendency for preionization (e.g., R = i-C4H9, 5 2, C6H5(CH3)CH, allyl), and as water is a product of equation 17, it could initiate a chain reaction because boron trichloride is of course readily hydrolyzed to hydrochloric acid and boric acid. Trialkyl borates react (equation 18) with hydrogen chloride, but again only if the alkyl group is electron-releasing (7,60,61,71). d(+)-Tri-1 -phenylethyl borate gave much racemized but configuration-retained 1-chloro-l-phenylethane (a similar stereochemical result was obtained from ROH and BC13) (60), whereas the triallyl borate-hydrogen chloride reaction, which only proceeded at high temperature, was accompanied by anti-Markownikoff addition to give tri-3-chloropropyl borate and 1,2-dichloropropane (71).…”