Volatile corrosion inhibitors (VCIs) compose a class of chemical compounds that have a
suitable vapor pressure with which to diffuse throughout an enclosed volume, adsorb onto any
exposed metallic surface within the volume, and inhibit corrosion in the adsorbed state. It has
been demonstrated previously that the adsorption of volatile corrosion inhibitors (VCIs)
depends upon environmental conditions, the variation of which in practical situations may
dramatically affect the kinetics of VCI adsorption. Adsorption kinetics influence the overall
performance of VCI as they are required to adsorb before corrosion inhibition may occur,
although the extent of inhibition cannot necessarily be directly inferred from adsorption
monitoring. This study attempts to evaluate VCI performance by utilizing surface enhanced
Raman Spectroscopy to monitor the adsorption kinetics of VCI on exposed steel and copper
surfaces while simultaneously performing real-time corrosion rate measurements with a
multi-electrode array sensor in order to correlate VCI adsorption with corrosion inhibition. The
relative efficacies of two VCIs to inhibit corrosion of carbon steel and copper were measured
as the time dependent corrosion rate ratio of surfaces with VCI exposure to surfaces without
VCI exposure in both humid and ambient environments.