Polymerization of olefinic monomers using a four component initiator

Claim 1

In a process for the polymerization of an olefinic monomer selected from the group consisting of a vinyl chloride, a vinylidene chloride, ethylene, propylene, a mixture of said monomers, and a mixture of said monomer with a vinyl ester which comprises contacting said monomer, at a temperature from -30° to +100° C, with a polymerization initiator consisting essentially of a combination of (1) an oxidizing agent selected from the group consisting of hydrogen peroxide, persulphates, permanganates, chlorates, perchlorates, bichromates, bromates, ceric salts, oxaziranes, and organic peroxides and hydroperoxides, (2) a chelate compound of a metal in which compound the metal is still capable of accepting one or more electron pairs from an electron donor, the said chelate compound having the formula: Xn[MQ.sub.s (D.sub.p A).sub.m ] in which X represents an anion or a cation; n is zero, in the case of non-ionizable chelates, or an integer or an improper fraction, in the case of ionizable chelates, equal to the number of electrical charges of the ionic grouping [MQ.sub.s (D.sub.p A).sub.m ]; M is titanium, iron, vanadium, aluminum, tin, manganese, chromium, cobalt, copper, zinc, or bismuth; Q is an oxygen or sulphur atom or a lower alkyl or lower alkoxy group: D is an electron doublet donor group selected from the group consisting of carbonyl, carboxyl, amino, imino, amido, hydroxy, and mercapto; A joins together the D radicals and either is a valence bond or a hydrocarbon chain of up to 12 carbon atoms carrying the groups D terminally or at any point on or in the chain, the said chain being linear or branched and unsubstituted or substituted by an aromatic or a cycloaliphatic residue or is a polyvalent cyclic aromatic residue, p is an integer equal to or higher than 2, which is the number of donor groups in the ligand of formula D p A, s is zero or an integer, and m is an integer equal to or higher than 1, s and m being such that pm + s has a value lower than the maximum coordination number of the metal M, and (3) an electron donor in amount at most equal to that required to complex completely the metal of the chelate compound (2), the said electron donor being selected from the group consisting of amines, alcohols, ethers, aldehydes, ketones, imines, oximes, amides, sulphonamides, and phosphonamides, the molar proportions of said components (1) and (2) of the said initiator being each 0.0005 to 5% based on the monomer, the improvement which comprises said polymerization initiator further containing a component (4) a chelate, complex, or salt of a metal of group IB, IIB, IVB, VB, VIB, VIIB, IIA, IIIA, IVA, VA, or VIII of the Periodic Table in which the degree of coordination of the metal is different from the degree of coordination of the metal in the said chelate compound (2), the amount of component (4) being from 10 - 6 to 10 - 3 molecules per molecule of the said olefinic monomer.