The thermal decomposition of complexes of the formulae: Cu(IMDAH)xCI 2, Cu(BIMDAH)~C12 (x = 2 or 4), Cu(BTAH)2CI2, Cu(5MBTAH)2C12, Cu(BIMDA)2, Cu(PDZ)C12, and Cu(PYM)CI2 (IMDAH = imidazole, BIMDAH = benzimidazole; BTAH = benzotriazole; 5MBTAH = 5-methyl-benzotriazole; PDZ = pyridazine; PYM = pyrimidine) has been studied in an oxidizing environment using thermogravim~tric (TG) analysis. The TG profiles of all the complexes indicate degradation of the azole ligands and conversion to copper oxides. The Cu-azole complexes retain much higher fractions of the Cu in the degradation residue than the Cu(PDZ)C12 and Cu(PYM)CI 2 complexes which volatilize most of the Cu on thermal decomposition. These differences are interpreted on the basis ofmetalligand bonding and the participation of redox reactions in the thermal decomposition mechanism.Azole ligands are used extensively as corrosion inhibitors in the antique [1] and printed circuit board industries [2]. The coordination nature of the metal-azole bonding as well as the molecular bond strength are important factors in determining the effectiveness of the corrosion inhibition process [3,4]. To investigate the metal-azole chemistry and their thermal properties, several model complexes have been prepared by directly reacting the free ligand with a metal compound. Previously, we and others have used X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) [3,5], Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) [5], and X-ray diffraction [6] to study the coordination chemistry of these materials. In the current work we employ thermogravimetric (TG) analysis to investigate their thermal decomposition mechanisms [4].Several authors have studied the effect of coordination chemistry and lattice distortion on the thermal stability of metal complexes [7][8][9].