I've been studying destoyer and it tells me that t-butoxide(if i spelled it right) favors unstable double bond in E2. However, ethoxide follows zaitsev rule. Can anybody tell me why?

First of all its not unstable the double bond its just less substituted which makes it less favorable.

The answer is because t-butoxide is big and bulky and cant dig into the middle to pull off a H, but EtO- is much smaller and can get in there to take off the H to form more stable zaitsev product

First of all its not unstable the double bond its just less substituted which makes it less favorable.

The answer is because t-butoxide is big and bulky and cant dig into the middle to pull off a H, but EtO- is much smaller and can get in there to take off the H to form more stable zaitsev product

:thumbup:

First of all its not unstable the double bond its just less substituted which makes it less favorable.

The answer is because t-butoxide is big and bulky and cant dig into the middle to pull off a H, but EtO- is much smaller and can get in there to take off the H to form more stable zaitsev product

oh...i see how it works.
Thank you so much:)