Due to their highly reactive nature, metal organic compounds require sophisticated sample preparation. Butyl lithium, a rather instable compound, which readily reacts with water and oxygen, is an example. For quality control and further usage it is therefore important to determine their exact content. With thermometric titration, Metrohm offers a method that is fast, robust, and very reliable for measuring metal organic compounds. Application Note AN-H-142 has more details on this application.
Using manual titration to determine the concentration of such compounds is neither practical nor reliable, as it is based on a color change in the solution, which many not always be registered exactly, depending on the individual who performs the analysis.
Thermometric titration, on the other hand, is a viable replacement for potentiometric determination and manual titration, respectively. Thermometric titration is faster (less than three minutes per titration), the sensor (a robust thermometer) does not require any kind of maintenance, and the same sensor can be used for any kind of titration such as acid/base, redox, complexometric, and precipitation titrations alike. Moreover, this sensor does not have to be calibrated (no potential is measured) and it is insensitive to aggressive media.