Determination of hydroperoxide content in complex hydrocarbon mixtures by gas chromatography/mass spectrometry.

A known principle in which triphenylphosphine is allowed to be oxidized by hydroperoxides to triphenylphosphine oxide, was developed into an analytical method for determination of hydroperoxide content in light mineral oils using GCMS-detection and quantification. By suitable choice of reagent solution solvents and internal standard, the method proved to be simple to apply and very rugged. For a series of oven-aged oil samples the developed method gave results with a satisfactory correlation to an established iodometric method (which also gave a higher standard deviation). A mechanistic explanation for interference of high concentrations of added aldehydes on measurements was also suggested, but it was found that the interference is of no practical consequence for oxidized oil samples.