Variations in the Interplay of Intermetallic and Metal Chalcogenide Units in Organotin-Copper Selenide Clusters.

We report the formation and structures of two new organotin-copper selenide clusters that were obtained in a two-step procedure. First, [(R1Sn)4Se6] [R1 = CMe2CH2C(O)Me] is reacted with [Cu(PPh3)3Cl] and (SiMe3)2Se to form a bright-orange powder, the nature of which could not be identified in detail, yet a suspension of it in CH2Cl2 reacts with N2H4·H2O to afford single crystals of two cluster compounds, either [(Cu3Sn){(R2Sn)2Se4}2{(R2Sn2)Se3}] (1) or [(N2H4)(Cu4Sn){(R2Sn)2Se4}3] [2; R2 = CMe2CH2C(NNH2)Me]. Both are based on an intermetallic CuxSn cluster core (x = 3, 4), which is surrounded by organotin selenide units in different fashions. The results foster the assumption of a complex equilibrium to be present in according reaction mixtures.