Bond Length

[Caroline C 1G]

Is there a way to calculate bond length, or is it a given value?

[Emma Boyles 1L]

I think bond length is always a given value because we have no way to calculate it.

[Catherine Yang 3G]

I agree. Dr. Lavelle mentions pretty frequently in class that he looks up the values.

[Allyson Charco Dis1G]

Question: How do we know if we should make a bond : single, double, or triple?
Would we try to achieve a formal charge of 0 and that is how we would know.

[Julie Steklof 1A]

I'm pretty sure bond length is determined experimentally.

[Brandon Fujii 1K]

First we must find the total number of electrons in the molecule. I usually make everything a single bond first and then adjust accordingly by adding double/triple bonds if I have too many electrons (more than the calculated total number of electrons that belongs in the molecule). Then we would calculate the Formal Charge of each atom to find the total formal charge of the molecule (which we would want to be zero because that is when the molecule is at the lowest energy state). I hope that this helps.