Monomeric, coloured germanium(II) and tin(II) di-t-butylamides, and the crystal and molecular structure of Ge(NCMe2[CH2]3CMe2)2

The orange (GeII) or maroon (SnII) bivalent group 4 metal di-t-butylamides were obtained from LiNBut2 and GeCl2·dioxan or SnCl2in tetrahydrofuran, and are low melting diamagnetic, volatile, monomeric (cryoscopy in C6H12), labile compounds (readily yielding·NBut2); X-ray analysis of the title compound to R= 0·091 shows that this related GeII amide is a monomer in the crystal with a long Ge–N bond of 1·885Å and an NGeN angle of 111·4(5)°.