Molecular-level changes in poly(1-trimethylsilyl-1-propyne) [PTMSP] were observed using solid-state 13C NMR. These changes are attributed to the effect of polymerization catalyst on polymer configuration and the influence of methanol conditioning and physical aging on chain mobility. Chain mobility is deduced from carbon spin-lattice relaxation times ( T 1). In the solid-state 13C NMR spectrum of TaCl 5-synthesized PTMSP, the α-methyl carbon resonance is split into two peaks (25.5 and 29.5 ppm), indicating the existence of both cis and trans isomers. In the spectrum of the NbCl 5-catalyzed polymer, however, the peak assigned to the trans isomer is absent, suggesting that PTMSP synthesized with NbCl 5 catalyst has a more regular configuration than PTMSP prepared with TaCl 5 catalyst. For all PTMSP films, T 1 values decrease during methanol conditioning and then increase upon aging, indicating that molecular motion is enhanced by methanol treatment and reduced by aging. Methanol conditioning enhances carbon molecular motion by a similar amount in both NbCl 5- and TaCl 5-synthesized PTMSP, except for the mobility of carbons assigned to the trans isomer (which notably exhibits the largest percentage decrease in relaxation time). In the initial state, the presence of the trans isomer, which has less rotational freedom than the cis isomer, resulted in TaCl 5-synthesized PTMSP having higher T 1 values than the NbCl 5-catalyzed counterpart. Although the trans isomer present in the TaCl 5-catalyzed membrane imparts rigidity, it also induces disorder in chain packing. As the TaCl 5-catalyzed PTMSP membrane was previously shown to be more permeable than the NbCl 5-catalyzed PTMSP, disorder in chain packing seems to be more important than polymer mobility when high permeability is desired.