Two-stage hydroconversion process (hydrocracking and reforming) using a stabilized aluminosilicate hydrocracking catalyst

Claim 1

In a process for the production of a product comprising reformed cracked gasoline from a substantially paraffinic hydrocrackable hydrocarbon feed, containing less than 10 volume percent aromatics, by the steps comprising hydrocracking and reforming, said hydrocracking being effected under ordinary hydrocracking conditions, including a temperature in the range 400°-850° F. and a hydrogen rate of 1,000-20,000 SCF per barrel of said feed, by contacting said feed with a substantially porous hydrocracking catalyst composite, said composite having a surface area of 50 to 700 square meters per gram, said composite comprising an amorphous simultaneously cogelled silica-alumina cracking base component and at least one catalytic hydrogenation component selected from the group consisting of noble elements of Group VIII of the Periodic Chart of the Atoms, said cracking base component containing at least 80 weight percent amorphous silica-alumina of which the alumina content is in the range from about 30 to 98 weight percent and the balance thereof comprises at least one inorganic refractory oxide selected from the group consisting of oxides of Group II and of the other refractory oxides of Groups III and IV, said elements being present in said composite in at least one form selected from the group consisting of oxides and sulfides and the metal, thereby producing a hydrocarbon hydrocrackate; said reforming being effected by contacting at least a substantial portion of said hydrocrackate with an ordinary reforming catalyst under ordinary catalytic reforming conditions, including a temperature in the range 700°-1,000° F., thereby producing said gasoline products, the improvement comprising carrying out said hydrocracking using a stabilized catalytic cracking composite, said stabilization being obtained by admixing an organic-metal compound precipitate with a freshly prepared gelatinous silica-alumina precursor of said cogelled cracking base component, said precipitate resulting from the interaction, by complex compound formation of metathesis, of a water-soluble compound of at least one of said elements with at least one organic gravimetric reagent therefor, said reagent and compound exhibiting a solubility product, Ksp, of less than about 10 -3 , and converting the resulting mixture into said stabilized catalyst, said converting comprising at least a step of calcining by maintaining said resulting mixture at a temperature in the range of from about 500° F. to 1,800° F. for a period sufficient for expelling volatile portions of the mixture and in the range of from about 1 to 48 hours.