.

Keeping this in view, what is the purpose of cracking?

Cracking, in petroleum refining, the process by which heavy hydrocarbon molecules are broken up into lighter molecules by means of heat and usually pressure and sometimes catalysts. Cracking is the most important process for the commercial production of gasoline and diesel fuel.

One may also ask, what are the two types of cracking? Types of Cracking - Thermal Cracking and Catalytic Cracking. Cracking is a process by which complex high molecular weight organic compounds are broken down into smaller fragments of molecules. The complex high molecular weight organic compounds are generally long chained hydrocarbons such as petroleum.

Keeping this in consideration, why do we break up long chain hydrocarbons?

Cracking allows large hydrocarbon molecules to be broken down into smaller, more useful hydrocarbon molecules. Cracking produces a mixture of smaller alkanes and alkenes. This helps to meet the demand for the more useful fractions and to increase profit.

How are alkanes cracked?

Cracking is a reaction in which larger saturated hydrocarbon molecules are broken down into smaller, more useful hydrocarbon molecules, some of which are unsaturated: the original starting hydrocarbons are alkanes. the products of cracking include alkanes and alkenes , members of a different homologous series.