“…Details of the spectrometer used here have been given previously. [9] A Sacher Lasertecknik tunable diode laser, model TEC 500, with output centered at 1450 nm was used to record Doppler-limited spectra between 6600 and 6900 cm −1 , following 193 nm ArF excimer laser photolysis of 3,3,3 trifluoropropene, CF 3 C 2 H, as a source of C 2 H. For most of the work, a dual beam setup was employed to reduce laser source noise and the signal and reference beams were imaged on to the elements of an a.c.-coupled dual InGaAs photoreceiver (New Focus 1617). A spectrum was obtained by averaging 40 (typically) photolysis laser shots per wavelength step of, normally, 0.005 cm −1 in a 1:1 mixture of CF 3 C 2 H and argon at a total pressure of 1.0 Torr with a detection time gate of 1.0 µs starting at either zero time delay following the photolysis or after few µs of delay time to allow for partial collisional relaxation of the initially hot sample.…”